THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 


THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

NEW  YORK  •    BOSTON  •    CHICAGO  •   DALLAS 
ATLANTA  •    SAN  FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN  &  CO.,  LIMITED 

LONDON  •   BOMBAY  •    CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 

THE  MACMILLAN  CO.  OF  CANADA,  Lnx 

TORONTO 


f  The 

Mastery  of  Nervousness 

Based  Upon  Self  Reeducation 


BY 

ROBERT  S.  CARROLL,  M.D. 

MEDICAL  DIRECTOR  HIGHLAND  HOSPITAL 
ASHEVILLE,  NORTH  CAROLINA 


THIRD  REVISED  EDITION 


iQeto  garb 

THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 
1918 

A.U  rights  reserved 


£3 


BIOLOGY 
LIBRARY 


COPYRIGHT,  1917, 
BY  THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 


Published,  June,   1917 
Second  Edition,  Revised,  November,  1917 
Third  Edition,  Revised,  November,  1918 


TO  FATHER, 

WHO  DREAMED; 

TO  MOTHER, 

WHO  WROUGHT 


387671 


THE  PROBLEM 


THE  modern  man  is  to-day  facing 
for  himself  or  his  children  the 
problem  of  nervous  adjustment — 
that  problem  which  is  becoming  more 
complicated  each  decade.  In  the  com- 
plexity and  intensity  of  modern  life, 
this  question  is  more  and  more  fre- 
quently presented  to  the  individual: 
66  Shall  I  lower  my  standards,  shall  I 
surrender  in  whole  or  in  part;  or 
shall  I  select  wisely  and  train  for 
mastery  1"  That  the  latter  decision 
is  possible  for  the  majority  of  serious- 
minded  men  and  women  is  the  sole 
reason  for  the  following  pages. 


TABLE  OP  CONTENTS 


CHAPTER  I  PAfl, 

THE  AGE  OF  NERVOUSNESS •  ••  •.     1 

Prevalence  of  nervousness — Man  a  splendid  creation — 
Man's  capacity  for  complex  adjustments — Man  essen- 
tially a  nervous  being — The  age  of  flux — The  effeminat- 
ing influences  of  civilisation — Rapid  modern  advance  of 
civilisation — Nervousness  now  affecting  all  classes — 
Modern  restlessness — Much  attention  given  functional 
disorders — Multiplication  of  cults  and  isms — Conscious 
and  unconscious  suggestion  in  modern  therapeutics — 
Modern  high  tension  life — Modern  intensity — Modern 
stimulation  multiplying  faster  than  nervous  adaptability 
Loss  of  habit  of  deliberation — An  age  of  specialism — 
Complexity  of  choice  offered  man — The  intense  competi- 
tion of  modern  life — Complexity  of  modern  existence — 
Comforts  becoming  necessities — Loss  of  the  play  life. 

CHAPTER  II 
WHAT  Is  NERVOUSNESS? 9 

The  valuable  nervous  temperament — Man's  capacity  for 
adjustment  his  greatest  asset — Physical  adjustments — 
Mental  adjustments — Moral  adjustments — Adjustments 
accomplished  through  the  reaction  capacity  of  the  nerv- 
ous system — Varying  levels  of  reaction  capacity — Nerv- 
ous action  the  highest  expression  of  vital  force — Nature 
of  nervousness — Nervous  activity  becoming  nervousness 
when  misdirected  or  overactive — Reason  given  to  direct 
choice — Frequency  of  misdirected  nervous  activity — 
Nervous  overactivity  common — Will  given  to  limit  the 
expenditure  of  nervous  activity — Self,  not  nerves,  at 
fault — Nervous  health  a  mental  state — Influence  of  mind 
on  the  body  through  the  sympathetic  nervous  system 
— Definition  of  nervousness. 

CHAPTER  III 

TYPES  OF  NERVOUSNESS      ..     ......     .     17 

The  motor  type — Waste  of  energy — The  hypersensitive 
type — Slaves  to  sensation — The  suggestible  type — Sug- 


CONTENTS 

PAOX 

gestion  from  without — Autosuggestion — Fatigue — The 
fatigable  type — Emotional  waste — Neurasthenia  popular 
— The  hypochondriacal  type — The  self-centred  type — 
Conceited  neurotics — The  repressed  type — Chronic 
energy  leakage. 

CHAPTER  IV 
GETTING  BEADY  TO  BE  NERVOUS 27 

Heredity — The  enemy  at  the  gate — The  neuropathic 
constitution  transmitted  through  heredity — Damaging 
influence  of  food  intemperance  on  heredity — Damage  on 
posterity  of  alcohol  indulgence — The  influence  of  heredity 
on  the  individual — Abuse  of  tobacco — Home  training 
— The  relation  of  environment  to  nervousness — Start- 
ing the  child  wrong — The  child  tyrant — The  value  of 
regularity  in  infant  feeding — Errors  in  early  feeding — 
Food  antipathies — Damage  of  neglected  likes  and  dislikes 
— The  idly-bred  child — Teaching  exaggerated  self-love 
— Treatment  of  big  and  little  pains — Dodging  difficulties 
— Nervousness  and  unconscious  imitation — Psychic  in- 
fection— Teaching  damaging  fear — The  moral  element  in 
home  training-— Education — The  personal  influence  of 
teachers — Common  ignorance  of  educators  of  applied  psy- 
chology— Forced  learning — Defective  foundations — 
Early  mental  exhaustion — Teaching  facts,  not  princi- 
ples— Inculcating  knowledge,  not  truth — Education  and 
excess  of  individualism. 

CHAPTER  V 
EATING  EERORS    .     ,     .     . 41 

Relation  of  food  to  body — Man  mastering  heredity — The 
human  body  an  engine — Food  and  air  changed  into  heat 
and  energy — Increased  food  plenty  and  high  living — 
Classes  of  foods — Food  damage — Instinct  versus  rea- 
son in  eating — Food  fads — The  relation  of  food  to  work 
— The  food  for  physical  work — The  food  for  nervous 
work — Food  excess  common — Digestive  force  wasted — 
— Autointoxication  from  food — Damaging  results  of 
food  abuse — The  irritants  of  indigestion — Serious 
diseases  from  autointoxication — Normal  alkalin- 
ity of  the  tissues — Alkaline-  and  acid-forming  foods — 
Damage  from  excess  of  sweets — Frequency  of  subacidosis 
— Breaking  the  chemical  balance  of  nutrition — Damage 
from  salt  excess — Damage  from  water  restriction — 
Damage  from  drug  foods — Food  and  morals — Mental 
and  moral  inferiority  due  to  errors  in  diet — Abomina- 
tions of  cookery — Unconscious  criminality  of  the  kitchen. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  VI  PAOB 

THE  PENALTY  OF  INACTIVITY 59 

Man  created  for  activity — Primitive  exercise — The  body 
made  for  work — Muscle  making  man — Conscious  and 
unconscious  muscles — Storehouses  of  vitality — Will  and 
muscle — Wit  versus  muscle — Fatigue  versus  exhaus- 
tion— Harmlessness  of  fatigue — Fatigue  the  normal 
basis  for  appetite,  sleep  and  strength — Developing 
energy  surplus — Fatigue  no  excuse  for  inactivity — False 
fatigue — Muscular  exhaustion  seldom  serious — Nervous 
exhaustion  from  wrong  methods  of  work — Nervous 
exhaustion  from  autointoxication — The  penalty  of  in- 
activity— Idleness  the  poison-breeder — The  toxins  of  in- 
activity— Under-used  bodies  and  overused  brains — De- 
fective muscular  development — The  pampered  body — 
Girls  and  Mrs.  Grundy — Neglect  of  developed  muscles — 
Stopping  play  in  youth — Stopping  physical  work  with 
maturity — The  "tabby-cat  life" — Exercising  with  teeth 
and  tongue — Fat,  flabby  and  forty — Real  breathing  and 
the  muscles — Pride  in  Inactivity — Inactivity  and  flabby 
wills — Idly  busy — Laziness  destroying  the  sense  of  real- 
ity— Man  created  for  productive  activity. 

CHAPTER  VII 
EATING  FOR  EFFICIENCY .72 

What  to  eat — Efficiency  dependent  upon  the  nervous 
system — The  relation  of  food  to  work — The  profound  in- 
fluence of  food — The  value  and  danger  of  appetite — 
Dietary  perversions — Nervous  indigestion — Air-swallow- 
ers — Protein  poisoning — Acids  from  sweets. 

CHAPTER  VIII 
EATING  FOB  EFFICIENCY — CONTINUED      ....     82 

Right  use  of  sweets — Excess  of  sweets — Acids  versus 
sweets — Moderation  in  sweets — Right  use  of  proteids — 
Shall  we  eat  meat? — Simple  versus  elaborate  foods — 
Use  and  abuse  of  fats — The  uncontrolled  palate — The  un- 
educated palate — Oversoluble  foods — Bran  preventing 
overabsorption — Drugs  as  foods — The  influence  of  season- 
ing— Efficient  eating — The  benefit  of  water  in  diet — 
Society's  demands  on  the  digestion — Mastering  the 
palate — Food  sprees — Eating  for  muscular  work — Eat- 
ing for  nervous  work — Overeating  and  under-thinking — 
Forced  feeding — Fasting — Cultivating  an  appetite — The 
value  of  mastication — Deliberate  eating  preventing 
excesses — Dangers  in  rapid  eating — Fermentation  or  put- 
refaction— Diet  for  the  toxic — Diet  for  the  thin — Diet 
for  the  fleshy — Ease  of  influencing  health  through  diet. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  IX 
WORK 99 

Wits  and  brawn — Advantages  of  wits — Snobbery  of  idle- 
ness— Hothouse  women — Penalty  of  idleness — Relaxed 
muscles  and  relaxed  characters — Sham  work — Idleness 
and  fatigue — Nature  of  most  overwork — Worry  and 
fatigue — Relation  of  emotion  to  work — Square  pegs  in 
round  holes — Discomfort  or  pleasure  in  action — Rising 
above  incidents — Work's  contribution  to  mastery — At- 
tempting to  outgeneral  Nature — The  therapy  of  work — 
Health  through  exercise — Educating  the  involuntary 
muscles — The  buoyancy  of  health — The  price  of  unusual 
health — The  weariness  of  under-development — Action 
the  witness  of  the  will — Raising  the  fatigue  limit — 
The  responsive  voluntary  muscular  system — Introspec- 
tion versus  work — Mastery  through  work — The  bless- 
ings of  drudgery — Pride  in  work. 

CHAPTER  X 
PLAY 113 

The  fine  art  of  play — Society  at  play — Play  and  the 
weather — Out-of-door  play — Learning  to  play — Whole- 
some forms  of  play — Indoor  play — Getting  into  condi- 
tion— Keeping  in  shape — Attitude  deciding  between  work 
and  play — Idealism  of  work — Making  play  of  work — The 
master-man  a  true  sportsman — The  moral  element  in 
play. 

CHAPTER  XI 
TANGLED  THOUGHTS 123 

The  mind's  omnipotence — The  mind  a  superb  instru- 
ment— Sensation — Perception — Apperception  —  Memory 
— Ideation — Judgment — Reason — Selection  the  mind's 
omnipotence — Attention — Inattention — The  thousand 
4  different  I's — Selecting  one's  own  world — The  critical 
faculty — Tangled  thoughts — Limited  interests — Errors 
of  interpretation — False  judgment — Confusing  feeling 
and  reason — Reviewing  harmful  memories — Superficial 
knowledge — Suggestibility — Damage  of  self-attention — 
Error  and  illness — Damaging  suggestions  from  profes- 
sional sources — Nervousness  as  a  defect  of  mental  de- 
velopment— Fixed  ideas — Fantasy  confused  with  reality 
— Morbid  imaginings — The  power  of  the  wish — Hazy 
mental  living — Habits  reducing  life's  effort — Introspec- 
tion— "Attention-pains" — Damage  of  bad  mental  habits 
— Health  fundamentally  a  mental  state. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  XII  PAOE 

EMOTIONAL  TYRANNY 142 

Nature  of  the  emotions — Adjustments  influenced  by  in- 
telligence, imitation  and  the  pleasure-pain  sense — Emo- 
tions primitive  and  fundamental — Emotional  intensity  of 
the  nervous — Emotions  the  source  of  all  pleasure  and  un- 
pleasantness— Mind  and  body  linked  by  the  emotions 
— Intimate  relation  of  emotions  to  the  involuntary 
muscles — Relation  of  emotions  to  voluntary  muscles — 
Subconscious  emotional  unrest — Emotions  influenced  by 
toxic  conditions — Emotions  of  anticipation — Emotions 
of  participation — Emotions  of  realisation — Power  of  the 
emotions — Emotions  that  invigorate — Emotions  that 
damage — Emotions  producing  nervous  disorders — Moods 
the  offspring  of  emotions — Inaccurate  emotional  esti- 
mates— Emotions  impairing  logic — Emotional  poise 
— Emotional  tyranny — Destructive  emotions — Tremen- 
dous rOle  played  by  fear— Phobias,  the  disease  of  fear 
— Worthy  and  unworthy  invalidism — Invalid  ugliness — 
Emotional  slavery. 

CHAPTER  XIII 
ILLS  AND  OUR  WILLS 159 

Nature  of  the  will— Man's  will  his  battlefield— Selection 
the  power  of  the  intellect — Attention  the  power  of  the 
will — The  will's  freedom  of  choice — The  effort  of  atten- 
tion— The  ability  of  attention  the  heart  of  character 
strength — The  feeling  of  effort  and  will — Power  of  will- 
formed  habits  to  simplify  life — Endurance  increased 
through  disciplined  will — Self-control  rooted  in  the  pow- 
ers of  selection  and  attention — Willing,  not  merely 
thinking,  essential  to  progress — Enemies  of  the  will — 
Indolence — Indecision — Doubt — Self-indulgence — Wilful- 
ness — The  vital  mistake  of  failure  to  cultivate  will — 
Wills  and  our  ills — Discussing  our  ills — The  argument 
against  stimulants  and  drug-comfort — Surrender  to 
small  irritations — Doing  or  doping — Willlessness  and 
wreckage. 

CHAPTER  XIV 
CLEAR  THINKING      .     .     . 176 

The  interwoven  mind — Cures  through  suggestion — Sub- 
stituting facts  for  error — Thought  selection — Common- 
ness of  passive  attention — Attention  the  product  of  in- 
terest in  the  untrained — Interest  the  product  of  atten- 
tion in  the  trained — All  consciousness  requires  an  object 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

— The  selection  of  the  object  of  attention — Mental  rejec- 
tion the  art  of  forgetting — Replacing  wasteful  by  profit- 
able thoughts — Cultivating  the  critical  sense — Training 
in  clear  thinking — Eliminating  mental  error — Mixing 
sentiment  with  ideas — Reasoning  in  the  face  of  prejudice 
— Recognising  reality — Exaggeration  of  expression  in- 
juring clear  thinking — Emotional  intoxication — Clear 
thinking  associated  with  daily  doing — Failure  through 
neglect  of  reality — Swaying  mental  foundations — Sub- 
stituting normal  for  disordered  ideas — Multiplying  in- 
terests— Thinking  above  self — Forethought  mastering 
life — Scientific  forethought — The  power  of  thought  to  at- 
tract thought  of  kind. 

CHAPTER  XV 
MOULDING  THE  EMOTIONS    ...     .     .     .  .  .     .  195 

Physical  help — Attaining  emotional  comfort — Thought 
help— Reason  replacing  emotional  complexes — Basing 
judgment  on  knowledge,  not  feeling — Replacing  hurt- 
ful emotions — Feeling  help — The  curative  power  of 
helpful  emotions — Emotional  topers — Learning  normal 
emotional  life — Emotional  training  in  the  home — De- 
pression emotion's  temptation — Replacing  the  morbid 
with  the  wholesome— Daily  emotional  training — Dwarf- 
ing the  higher  emotions — Emotional  help  for  the  irri- 
table— Emotional  help  for  the  fearful — Faith  displac- 
ing fear — Emotional  help  for  the  depressed — The  sick 
in  moods — Will  help — Big  and  little  pains — Self-control 
and  emotions — Remoulding  the  emotions — Enduring  en- 
joyment must  be  earned. 

CHAPTER  XVI 
WILLING  WILLS  .     ...    .     ...     .•    .     .     .     .  214 

Necessity  for  will  reeducation — True  will  the  only  force 
which  can  effect  right  living — Will  keeps  us  in  the  road 
chosen  by  reason — Action  born  of  will — Life's  ills  chal- 
lenge our  wills — Lost  wills  common — Will-training  and 
habit-formation — Wilfulness  transformed  to  normal  will- 
ing— Willing  effort — Volition  versus  the  Isthmus — Fail- 
ure counsels  surrender — Supremacy  of  mind  over  body 
realised  through  the  will — Judicious  hardening — Prac- 
tical helps  in  willing — Willing  decision — Wishing  or 
willing  in  character  growth — Indecision  from  toxicity 
— Power  through  choice  of  the  disagreeable — Deciding 
to  decide — Decision  is  rest — Spasmodic  efforts  at  mas- 
tery— Discipline  from  without— -Willing  control — Will- 


CONTENTS 

PAOI 

power  reduced  from  exhaustion — The  will's  chief  ene- 
mies— Development  of  inhibition — Breaking  bad  nervous 
habits — Will  versus  pain — Conquering  inclination — 
Turning  dislikes  into  likes — Facing  the  sinister — The 
healing  power  of  will — Potent  relaxation  developing 
the  forces  of  will — Nervous  cure  is  self -cure — Inspiration 
and  the  inevitable. 

CHAPTER  XVII 

OUR  MORAL  SELVES  .     .     ..,.,.,     .     .     .  232 

The  moral  nature — Life  complicated  by  the  moral  ele- 
ment— Sliding  moral  scale — Primitive  fear-morality — 
Utilitarian  morality — Idealistiq  morality — Morality 
the  fight  of  the  good  with  the  better — Morality  answers 
the  "why"  and  the  "how"  of  conduct — Morality  de- 
cides the  choice  of  attention — Education  and  morality 
— Our  twofold  moral  habitat — The  moral  and  the  relig- 
ious— Religious  self-torture — Religion  dispensing  with 
morality — Morality  dispensing  with  religion — Clever- 
ness not  morality — Morality  independent  of  environ- 
ment— Morals  and  nervous  health — Relation  of  moral 
and  medical  sciences — Mind  a  gift,  character  a  victory — 
— The  struggle  for  perfection — The  nervous  character 
by  nature  a  moral  character — Our  moral  variability — 
Nervous  health  fundamentally  a  moral  state — Moral 
sickness — The  restlessness  of  empty  souls — Learning  how- 
good  life  is — The  moral  adds  something  to  every  rela- 
tion— True  morality  demands  growth — The  choice  which 
stands  for  destiny. 

CHAPTER  XVIII 

REBELLION      .     .     » :,"•;.  .     v     .  245 

Defective  adjustments — Weak  man  confronting  a  mighty 
existence — The  outer  battle  with  people  and  things — 
The  inner  battle  with  self — The  power  of  things  versus 
the  power  of  attitude — The  battle  of  duty  with  de- 
sire—Conditions for  continuous  enjoyment  non-exist- 
ent— Provisions  perfect  for  character  growth — The  prob- 
lem of  self-assertion — Man  an  engine  with  a  will — Self- 
assertion  versus  self-repression— Obedience  which  en- 
slaves— Force  essential  to  life — Yoking  self  with  the 
powers  of  Nature — Our  inability  to  create  force — Utilis- 
ing force  wisely  or  ill — Developing  self  into  a  dynamo — 
Man  capable  of  utilising  elemental,  physical,  mental  and 
spiritual  forces — Rebellion — Our  need  of  correction — Un- 
guided  force  destructive — The  mob  must  be  saved  from 


CONTENTS 

PAOl 

itself — The  waste  of  anger — Resentment  of  the  "eternal 
grind" — Cultivating  dissatisfaction — Despair  and  pes- 
simism— The  home  of  strife — Academic  and  wilful  con- 
tention— Power  of  mind  does  not  make  us  good — Whole- 
some rebellion. 

CHAPTER  XIX 

SURRENDER      .     .     .     «     . 259 

Life's  inevitable  disasters — The  false  value  of  things — 
Early  disillusionments — Many  losses  but  apparent — 
Meeting  calamity — Surrender  in  the  face  of  trouble — 
Recklessness — The  appeal  of  power — Rebellion  in  the  face 
of  loss — Wholesome  recklessness — Surrender  to  smould- 
ering rebellion — Resenting  life's  industrial  relations — 
Disregard  of  duty — Cooperating  with  the  laws  of  well- 
doing— Despair — The  surrender  of  restraint  to  reckless- 
ness— Living  at  half-power — Grumbling  in  the  midst  of 
plenty — Defeated  life  foreordained  for  small  souls — 
Craving  the  unpossessed — Illness  pleaded  as  an  excuse 
for  failure — Devitalising  the  subconscious — The  disease 
of  self-pity — The  test  of  solitude — The  habit  of  self-com- 
munion— Moral  catastrophes — Despair  making  existence 
intolerable — The  bitterness  of  defeat — The  calamity  of 
spiritual  loss — The  incentive  of  disaster. 

CHAPTER  XX 
DISCORD  WITH  SELF  .     ....     .     .     .     .     .  272 

The  burden  of  self — The  common  burdens  of  existence — 
Inevitable  burdens — The  rectifying  sense  of  unworthi- 
ness — The  spiritual  conflict — Man's  capacity  for  suffer- 
ing— The  mission  of  suffering — Accepting  burdens  as 
reasons  for  failure — Essential  strife  with  self — Damag- 
ing strife  with  self — The  worry  habit — The  worrying 
world — The  nature  of  worry.  The  leakage  of  worry — 
Little  worries — Worry  masquerading  as  worthiness — 
The  morbid  conscience — Worry  and  conscience — The  suf- 
ferings of  conscience  normally  developmental — Con- 
science but  a  medium  for  truth — Conscience  defacing 
truth — The  easy-going  conscience — The  selfish  con- 
science— The  conventional  conscience — The  esthetic  con- 
science— Beauty  not  essentially  moral — The  artificial 
standards  of  the  morbid  conscience — The  scruples  of  mor- 
bid conscientiousness — The  helpful  leadership  of  the  vir- 
tuous conscience — Fatal  moral  damage  through  per- 
verted conscience — Consciousness  of  evil  a  mark  of  pro- 
gress— Conscience  making  slaves  or  victors. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  XXI  PAG1: 

SUBLIMATION  OF  STRIFE      .     V    '.     .     .     .     .     .  283 

Selfish  strife — The  eternal  ego — Desire  is  insatiable — 
Pride  of  externals — Striving  for  the  worthless — Pride  of 
existence  bartered  for  pride  of  appearance — Pride  re- 
senting correction — Unavoidable  battles — Soul  the  real 
master  of  life — Life  the  soul's  opportunity — The  soul 
creating  its  own  environment — Life's  inevitable  battles 
— Desires  versus  needs — Limiting  strife  to  our  needs 
— Man  must  fight — The  traitor,  self-pity — Mutineers  in 
life's  army — False  pride  displaced  by  constructive  pride 
— Wholesome  acceptance  of  limitations — Disciplined 
freedom  is  righteous  freedom — Freedom  through  faith 
and  hope — Faith  curing  moral  illness — The  strife  that 
saves — Commanding  one's  internal  weather — Catastro- 
phe creating  character — The  selective  power  of  the  soul 
— Power  through  renunciation — Every  choice  repre- 
sents a  surrender — Development  through  striving — Find- 
ing the  good,  not  the  easy — The  sublimation  of  strife. 

CHAPTER  XXII 
THE  FULFILMENT  OF  SELF  .     .     .     ....     .  295 

Life's  failures — Becoming  a  victim  of  circumstances — 
Seeking  pleasure,  not  mastery — Mechanical  lives — Lone- 
liness seeking  the  heights  or  the  depths — Cultivating 
brain,  neglecting  soul — The  certain  defeat  of  the  self- 
ish self — Training  for  efficiency — The  unseen  builders — 
First-hand  acquaintance  with  things — Armchair  piety — 
Disaster  sharpening  wits — Conquering  through  endur- 
ance— A  larger  self,  a  larger  life — Our  many-sided  per- 
sonality— Living  with  a  purpose — Finding  the  victorious 
self — No  life  necessarily  sordid — Lop-sided  moral  de- 
velopment— Finding  the  best  in  the  worst — Making  life 
generous — Saturating  labour  with  friendship — Filling 
self  with  constructive  energies — The  beauty  of  fine  liv- 
ing. 

CHAPTER  XXIII 
HARMONY .     .  307 

Life's  aims — The  individual's  certain  need  of  moral 
directorship — Man  free  to  do  his  worst  or  his  best — 
Measuring  self  against  Nature — Measuring  self  against 
the  unseen — The  only  satisfying  answer  to  the  query  of 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

existence — Setting  body,  mind  and  soul  to  work — Life's 
adjustments — The  possible  versus  the  actual  self — Choos- 
ing comfort  of  body  or  comfort  of  soul — Self  moulding 
life — Trembling  at  life's  feast — Unused  beauties  of  life — 
Harmony  is  life's  crowning  adjustment — The  spiritual 
seeks  the  best  in  everything — Harmony  in  complexity 
— The  din  of  human  discord — Where  is  peace? — Destroy- 
ing life's  harmonies — Learning  that  life  is  ready  to  yield 
happiness — An  optimistic  philosophy  essential  to  nervous 
stability — The  healthy  soul  is  self  in  order — The  serene 
self — The  harmony  of  the  simple  life. 


THE 
MASTERY   OF  NERVOUSNESS 

CHAPTEE  I 
THE  AGE  OF  NEBVOUSNESS 

Prevalence  of  Nervousness. — Man  was  a  splen- 
did creation;  he  is  to-day  capable  of  being  a 
splendid  creature.  His  greatness,  while  ex- 
pressed in  many  lines,  is  distinctly  most  evident 
when  we  consider  his  superb  capacity  for  complex 
adjustments.  He  has  conquered  his  planet ;  he  has 
charted  the  heavens;  he  foretells  to  the  nicety  of 
seconds  movements  stirring  the  unseen  limits  of 
space.  The  sea  is  his ;  and  he  floats  at  will  above 
the  clouds.  Fire,  earth,  air  and  water  are  his 
slaves — but  he  has  failed  to  master  himself !  His 
superb  powers,  probably  even  to-day  in  their  in- 
fancy, are  possible  because  of  his  intricate,  sensi- 
tive, responsive  nervous  system.  Man  is  essen- 
tially a  nervous  being.  Blood,  muscle,  bone, 
digestive  apparatus,  his  complex  secretory  system, 
all  exist  to  minister  unto  brain  and  nerves.  Evi- 
dence is  plentiful  that  through  all  time  this  regal, 
delicate  apparatus  has  been  the  chief  cause  of  his 
suffering,  as  well  as  of  his  progress.  Ignoring 
the  laws  of  his  being,  every  great  step  forward  in 
the  complexity  of  his  existence  has  been  marked 


2  - :        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

by  nervous  disasters.  Throughout  all  time  man 
has  known  his  surroundings  better  than  he  has 
understood  himself.  We  are  to-day  living  in  an 
age  of  flux.  Caesar  long  ago  decried  "the  effem- 
inating influences  of  civilisation. "  Never  in 
mankind's  splendid  history  has  discovery  chased 
discovery,  invention  succeeded  invention,  as  dur- 
ing the  last  generation.  Never  did  civilisation 
advance  with  such  bewildering  strides.  Never 
did  she  give  of  herself  to  so  large  a  proportion 
of  earth's  humanity.  From  the  lowliest  farmer 
on  his  hillside,  through  all  walks  of  mankind, 
response  to  changes  and  changing  conditions  of 
thought  and  action  is  felt.  Nervousness,  once  a 
disease  of  the  elect,  now  invades  the  homes  of  all 
classes.  My  neighbour's  domestic  tranquillity 
has  been  disturbed  these  nine  months  because  his 
faithful,  two-hundred-pound  black  Mary  is  suffer- 
ing with  the  "  nervous  prosteration. "  "De  heat 
ob  de  gas  range  has  sort  o'  a  drying  'feet  on  de 
brain,"  and  she  now  must  take  a  rest. 

Modern  Restlessness. — The  prevalence  of  mod- 
ern nervousness  cannot  be  computed.  No  neigh- 
bourhood is  without  its  nervous  sufferer.  Few 
homes  exist  in  which  some  member  is  not  the  ob- 
ject of  special  solicitude  because  of  weak  nerves. 
"He  is  a  nervous  child;"  "She  is  taking  the  rest- 
cure;"  "He  has  gone  to  pieces;"  "My  wife  is 
just  recovering  from  a  nervous  breakdown;"  "I 
am  as  nervous  as  a  cat ; "  "  Let  me  alone  until  I  pull 
myself  together;"  "Jones  is  'all  in,'  he  acts 
batty" — are  matter-of-course,  daily  exchanged 
expressions  these  modern  days.  In  fact,  the  man 


THE  AGE  OF  NERVOUSNESS  3 

or  woman  who  to-day  truthfully  and  quietly  can 
say,  "As  for  me  and  my  household,  nervousness 
is  unknown/'  is  indeed  rare  and  good  to  look 
upon. 

In  the  effort  to  help  this  multitude  of  the 
nervous,  civilised  lands  are  dotted  with  sanitaria, 
special  hospitals  and  rest-cure  resorts.  Thou- 
sands of  skilled  men  are  making  the  study  of  these 
disorders  their  life 's  work.  The  chemist  is  evolv- 
ing a  constantly  growing  list  of  more  or  less 
damaging  compounds  to  combat  the  multiplied 
manifestations  of  this  disease.  Special  foods, 
elaborate  systems  of  exercise,  spinal  supports  and 
rubber  heels,  specially  tinted  walls  and  harmless 
waters  from  faraway  springs,  begoggled  noses, 
and  beds  placed  compass-wise  and  insulated  with 
glass  casters,  slamless  doors  and  dogless  towns 
— all  speak  eloquently  of  modern  man's  nervous 
estate.  Few  magazines  published  are  of  so  high 
a  tone  that  they  do  not  carry  lengthy  advertise- 
ments of  some  new  method  of  thought  healing. 
New  religions  spring  into  existence  full-fledged, 
soon  counting  their  followers  by  the  tens  of 
thousands,  because  of  their  capacity  to  eradicate 
that  long  list  of  disorders  which  accurate  science 
recognises  as  manifestations  of  nervous  disease. 
Probably  the  majority  of  civilised  men  and  women 
are  to-day  making  conscious  concessions  to  their 
nerves,  avoiding  this  and  doing  that,  eating  meat 
or  not  eating  meat,  exercising  or  resting,  living 
this  life  or  avoiding  the  other,  suffering  or  expect- 
ing to  suffer  because  of  their  nerves. 

The  truly  intelligent  physician  recognises  that 


4  THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

more  than  half  of  his  work  is  directed  to  the 
overcoming  of  functional,  not  organic,  diseases. 
He  also  recognises  that  in  his  multiplied  and 
complex  efforts  to  relieve  patients,  many  of  the 
beneficial  effects  of  his  treatment  are  due  to  con- 
scious or  unconscious  suggestion.  He  will  tell 
you  that  dependable,  yes,  potent  as  are  certain 
medicines,  the  most  of  his  prescriptions  produce 
no  change  whatever  in  either  the  quality  or  the 
action  of  the  tissues  of  the  body;  that  in  only  a 
small  per  cent,  of  drugs  used  have  the  most 
accurate  scientific  investigations  been  able  to 
show  definite  physical  or  chemical  action.  The 
effects  of  the  majority  of  medicines  are  produced 
upon  the  patient's  mind.  In  many  of  the  other 
means  used  by  physicians  for  treatment,  the 
benefits  are  largely  the  result  of  mental  sugges- 
tion. Electricity,  hailed  a  generation  since  as 
the  great  rejuvenator  of  nervous  strength,  has 
long  since  been  discarded  by  the  educated  phy- 
sician, excepting  for  a  few  known,  definite, 
chemical  or  mechanical  effects  which  it  is  capable 
of  producing.  Science  now  recognises  that  many 
of  the  wonderful  cures  in  the  past  were  due  to 
its  influence  on  the  sufferer's  mind,  and  that  to- 
day these  effects  can  be  more  surely,  definitely 
and  honestly  obtained  by  more  direct  means. 
Hydro  therapy — the  method  of  treating  disease 
by  means  of  water — has  devised  many  compli- 
cated forms  of  water  application;  and  the 
devotees  of  water  cure  have  invented  intricate 
apparatus  to  carry  out  these  elaborate  forms  of 
treatment.  Hydrotherapy  intelligently  used  does 


THE  AGE  OF  NERVOUSNESS  5 

produce  definitely  helpful  physical  reactions, 
which  can  not  be  so  well  secured  otherwise;  but 
its  distinctively  curative  principles  are  few,  and 
the  scientific  use  of  water  has  an  unquestioned 
but  limited  scope  of  benefit.  All  of  these  various 
and  multiplied  means  of  combating  nervousness 
but  emphasise  the  widespread  prevalence  of  the 
disorder. 

Modern  restlessness  is  everywhere  in  evidence. 
Stolidity  is  rare,  stability  exceptional.  Our  chil- 
dren are  restless  and  uneasy,  constantly  plan- 
ning diversion  and  pleasure.  Even  the  three- 
year-old  child  begs  to  go  down-town  to  the  picture 
show.  Young  manhood  and  womanhood  rush 
from  school  into  the  great  vortex  of  the  world's 
work  with  a  restless  eagerness,  long  before  the 
nervous  system  has  been  trained  to  stand  strain 
without  damage.  The  mania  for  work  alternates 
with  a  frenzy  for  pleasure,  and  intensity  becomes 
the  key-note  in  many  modern  families.  All  too 
frequently  the  soothing  hand  of  age  fails  to  quiet 
the  restless  pulse.  The  household  has  hardly 
been  adjusted  to  the  return  from  the  winter  home 
before  the  summer  vacation  is  taken  in  the  midst 
of  hustle  and  bustle  and  a  commotion  which  is 
never  peace  and  at  best  but  doubtful  pleasure. 

Modern  life  is  high  tension  life — a  life,  of  in- 
creasing strain.  To  meet  it,  our  schools  and 
colleges  are  raising  their  standards  and  increas- 
ing their  demands.  Less  than  a  century  ago  a 
Master's  degree  from  the  best  colleges  was  given 
after  a  course  of  study  which  is  now  but  a  high 
school  requirement.  Often  our  children's  intel- 


6  THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

lects  are  forced  and  their  minds  keyed  to  concert 
pitch — the  minds  of  mere  boys  and  girls,  still  in 
knickerbockers  and  short  dresses;  and  modern 
standards  pursue  them  like  the  Fates  of  old,  nor 
dare  they  pause  nor  turn  back.  Intensity — not 
as  a  periodic  flash  of  force  to  meet  an  emergency, 
but  as  a  chronic,  devitalising  process — marks 
much  of  so-called  modern  education.  Not  only 
is  the  intellect  thus  damagingly  forced,  but  the 
emotional  life  is  trained  into  early  disequilibrium 
through  the  vivid  horrors  of  the  daily  news,  reek- 
ing with  slime  and  crime — the  world 's  garbage 
heap  laid  on  the  breakfast  table.  Modern  social 
intercourse  puts  a  premium  on  emotional  inten- 
sity. Brilliancy,  vivacity,  piquancy  command 
universal  homage ;  while  calmness,  simplicity  and 
repose  are  ofttimes  passed  by  as  wearisome. 
Will  development  is  neglected — 'tis  an  old-fash- 
ioned process.  Only  a  few  years  have  elapsed 
since  our  educational  leaders  have  recognised  the 
fundamental  necessity  for  physical  training. 
Will  and  body  alike  are  neglected  in  the  average 
home  in  this  day  of  high  speed,  high  pressure, 
high  finance  and  straining  for  high  places;  and 
the  strain  of  modern  living  grows  apace.  . 

Modern  Intensity. — Modern  stimuli  are  increas- 
ing much  faster  than  our  nervous  training  for 
adaptation.  Great  as  is  man's  capacity  for  com- 
plex adjustments,  the  multiplying  demands  of 
modern  life  are  coming  too  fast.  We  live  as 
travellers  on  a  limited  train.  Farms,  homes, 
villages,  cities,  rivers,  mountains  whirl  by. 
There  is  no  time  to  carefully  note  or  know  any 


THE  AGE  OF  NERVOUSNESS  7 

of  them.  Stops  are  few,  and  those  only  in  the 
midst  of  rush,  turmoil  and  bustle;  and  life  has 
become  but  "one  jammed  thing  after  another. " 
The  telephone  alone  has  brought  the  nation  into 
our  homes,  and  has  increased  our  points  of  con- 
tact a  thousandfold.  The  electric  car  and  the 
auto  have  enlarged  our  field  of  action  immensely, 
and  multiplied  our  duties,  responsibilities,  inter- 
ests and  opportunities  in  geometric  ratio. 
Modern  living  is  high  living — intellectually,  emo- 
tionally, socially.  It  is  a  kaleidoscopic  maze,  with 
increasingly  less  time  for  deliberation  and  con- 
templation. It  is  so  cluttered  with  external  inter- 
ests with  their  insatiable  demands  that  the  study 
or  even  the  recognition  of  life's  fundamentals  is 
becoming  a  lost  art  to  the  average  man.  He 
looks  to  the  specialist  in  all  branches  of  knowl- 
edge and  effort  to  think  for  him,  while  he  lives 
a  life  of  emotional  intoxication  and  superficial 
judgments  in  the  nerve-exhausting  struggle.  As 
for  himself,  the  silver  cord  of  reason  is  loosed 
and  the  golden  bowl  of  poise  is  broken. 

Never  has  such  an  infinite  variety  of  choice 
been  offered  man — choice  demanding  repeated 
series  of  readjustments.  Ours  is  an  age  of  com- 
petition. Many  industries  have  long  ceased  to 
expect  profit  from  their  regular  products,  depend- 
ing entirely  upon  scientific  utilisation  of  once 
rejected  by-products  for  gain.  Industrial  strife 
increases  with  the  years.  Brawn  resents  the  in- 
dependence of  brain,  and  struggles  with  increas- 
ing might  for  its  larger  portion.  Brain  conspires 
and  connives  to  retain  its  lion's  share.  The  pro- 


8  THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

f  essions  are  crowded  with  men  and  women  seeking 
to  rise  above  the  average  of  their  kind,  seeking 
by  intellectual  displacement  more  of  the  comforts 
and  honours  of  superiority.  Gold  and  art  and 
talent  and  time  and  ability  and  intensity  are  the 
prices  paid  for  social  supremacy.  The  demands 
of  all  walks  of  life  are  those  of  increased  intricacy 
and  complexity.  Each  succeeding  generation  of 
workers  carries  a  heavier  burden  of  responsi- 
bility. Modern  life  lays  upon  every  normal  in- 
dividual a  demand  for  either  increased  aggres- 
siveness, if  he  will  maintain  his  position  at  the 
forefront  of  progress,  or  an  increasingly  com- 
plicated self-defence,  if  he  is  not  to  be  hopelessly 
trampled  by  the  onrush  of  civilised  feet.  All 
things  simple  are  being  accounted  cheap  or  are 
subject  to  ridicule.  In  almost  every  home  the 
comforts  of  a  generation  gone  have  become 
to-day's  necessities;  while  luxury,  increasing 
though  it  does  life's  complexity  counties sf old,  is 
sought  and  claimed  by  the  majority  as  an  essen- 
tial comfort.  Pleasure  ever  beckons  to  the  weary 
modern  life — the  life  which  demands  to  be 
pleased,  demands  to  be  amused,  but  which  has 
long  since  lost  the  joy  and  blessing  and  recreation 
of  the  art  of  play. 


CHAPTEE  II 
WHAT  IS  NERVOUSNESS? 

The  Valuable  Nervous  Temperament. — As  we 
have  already  seen,  in  man's  unequalled  capacity 
for  adjustment  to  his  physical,  mental  and  moral 
surroundings  resides  his  almost  limitless  powers. 
His  body  apparently  thrives  best  in  the  temperate 
zone,  but  perfect  specimens  of  physical  strength 
and  health  may  be  found  from  the  eternal  ice- 
packs to  the  sweltering  tropics.  Human  flesh  and 
blood  have  now  stood  at  the  earth's  axes  where 
the  temperature  stays  so  deadly  low  as  to  congeal 
the  mercury  in  the  thermometer ;  while  the  trained 
puddler  works  regularly  and  rapidly,  guiding  the 
flowing  rivers  of  molten  steel  in  temperatures 
ranging  high  above  200  degrees.  The  aviator 
climbs  mile  upon  mile  into  the  rare  air  of  the 
deep  sky ;  his  brother  seeks  the  bottom  of  the  sea 
or  lives  his  working  life  entombed  in  the  black- 
ness and  heaviness  of  the  mine's  depths.  It  is 
given  the  human  body  to  adjust  itself  to  these 
and  a  thousand  more  variations. 

When  man's  mind  awoke,  he  found  himself  sur- 
rounded by  bewildering  intricacy.  Curiosity 
gave  place  to  wonder,  wonder  to  investigation, 
investigation  to  knowledge;  and  knowledge  is 
to-day  grouped  into  the  large  family  of  sciences 


10    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

which  have  revealed  to  human  understanding  the 
operations  of  the  laws  determining  the  growth 
of  the  bluet  of  the  mountainside,  the  iris-tinted 
sparkle  of  the  dewdrop,  and  the  everlasting,  un- 
swerving hurtling  of  systems  of  worlds  through 
the  limitless  void  of  space.  Within  the  human 
intellect  resides  a  power  of  adjustment  that  is 
marvellous,  a  power  which  makes  possible  an 
intimate  acquaintance  with  all  the  varied  and 
wondrous  manifestations  of  world  stuff  and 
order.  Man  lives  under  a  hundred  forms  of  gov- 
ernment, ruled  wisely,  brutally,  self-ruled  and 
enslaved.  A  thousand  religions  and  philosophies 
have  ordered  his  conduct,  and  to  all  these  the 
mind  has  responded  with  adjustments  which  have 
maintained  a  surprising  degree  of  sanity. 

In  his  moral  nature  progress  has  been  less 
rapid  and  universal;  nevertheless,  some  of  the 
greatest  miracles  of  human  adjustment  have 
occurred  in  this  sphere  of  his  being.  Few  civili- 
sations now  exist  which  do  not  demand  that  much 
which  is  humanly  instinctive  be  made  secondary 
to  the  will  of  man  or  the  interpreted  will  of  God. 
The  civilised  individual  is  indeed  rare  who  does 
not,  early  in  his  development,  rise  above  the  power 
of  animal  impulse  to  rule.  Physical  disabilities 
and  perverse  mental  habits  of  years  may  be 
changed  in  a  night,  when  some  great  light  breaks 
in  upon  the  human  soul! — light  which  stands  for 
liberty,  or  mastery,  or  victory,  or  purity  or  God- 
liness. There  is  truly  no  more  miraculous  ad- 
justment conceivable  in  human  nature  than  that 
which  tears  the  soul  away  from  the  multiplied 


WHAT  IS  NERVOUSNESS?  11 

and  unquestioned  pleasures  of  selfishness,  from 
the  seductive  and  tantalising  wooings  of  the  phy- 
sical, from  the  dominating  and  masterful  biddings 
of  ambition,  to  the  surrender  of  all  that  we  are 
wont  to  call  liberty  and  individuality,  in  response 
to  the  callings  of  the  still,  small  voice.  The  soul's 
capacity  to  accept  personal  injury  and  injustice 
and  humiliation  for  righteousness'  sake,  while 
rare,  illustrates  incontestably  the  scope  of  human 
capacity  for  moral  adjustment. 

Where,  may  we  ask,  resides  the  power  which 
makes  this  almost  infinite  variety  of  actions  and 
reactions  possible?  What  is  the  secret  of  this 
almost  God-like  ability?  Infinite  in  variety  as 
it  is,  its  accomplishment  results  alone  from  the 
reaction  of  man's  nervous  system  to  external  and 
internal  stimuli,  in  the  response  to  the  infinitude 
of  influences  which  surround  him  in  his  many- 
sided  universe,  or  which  challenge  him  through 
the  complexities  of  his  own  ever-changing  mind. 
Let  the  word  "  mother "  be  spoken  in  a  company 
of  ten.  Love,  sorrow,  responsibility,  tenderness, 
remorse,  gratitude,  fear,  determination,  pride  or 
bitterness  may  be  stimulated;  visions  of  child- 
hood flash  out  of  the  past,  memories  of  illness, 
recollections  of  the  art  and  the  efficiency  of  disci- 
pline, the  tender  face  with  its  halo  of  age.  These 
and  countless  other  emotions  and  impressions  but 
illustrate  the  variety  of  reactions  possible  to  the 
sound  of  two  syllables. 

Most  of  the  reactions  of  physical  adjustment 
are  carried  on  through  this  marvellous  nervous 
system  in  a  manner  quite  unknown  to  its  owner, 


12    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

activities  beneficently  placed  below  the  surface  of 
consciousness  to  be  continuously  executed  with- 
out effort  of  mind,  still  ever  subject  indirectly 
to  the  activities  of  consciousness.  Many  mental 
operations  become  automatic  through  habit,  and 
as  we  grow  older  more  and  more  of  our  mental 
accomplishments  are  carried  on  with  little  or  no 
conscious  thought  effort — thanks  to  this  great  law 
of  mental  economy.  Still  at  all  times,  in  all  sit- 
uations, the  normal  brain  with  its  myriad-sided 
mind  is  the  controlling  centre. 

The  capacity  for  reactions  and  adjustment 
varies  with  the  individual.  No  two  minds  possess 
equally  all  of  the  varying  possibilities  of  reaction 
power.  Every  one  of  life's  experiences  adds  to 
or  subtracts  something  from  this  capacity. 
Some  beings  are  mere  phlegmatic  dolts,  respond- 
ing with  less  activity  than  the  average  animal 
to  the  ceaseless  stimuli  of  their  surroundings. 
In  the  dull  brain  a  few  ideas  only  have  been  given 
birth.  To  feed,  to  laze,  to  avoid  effort — little 
else  counts  in  this  life  of  magnificent  possibilities. 
The  "thousand-souled  Shakespeare "  attends  and 
responds,  and  ten  thousand  beauties  of  thought 
and  pages  of  rare,  new  wisdom  and  undying 
truths,  and  appealing,  convincing,  living  portraits 
of  the  human  soul  are  penned — pages  to  delight, 
teach  and  inspire  the  sons  of  men  through  pass- 
ing generations.  Again  the  response  may  be  that 
of  the  wretched,  overwrought,  sensitive-plant, 
starting  with  every  sound,  shrinking  and  quiver- 
ing at  every  manifestation  of  force,  resenting  and 
suffering  in  the  presence  of  real  or  fancied  mis- 


WHAT  IS  NERVOUSNESS?  13 

understanding,  keenly  and  painfully  alive  to 
every  discomfort;  weakening  and  wilting  and 
retreating  from  every  hurt.  The  capacity  for 
human  responsiveness  is  limited  only  by  the 
capacity  of  the  mind  to  know,  the  emotions  to 
feel  and  the  will  to  act. 

When  we  understand  how  inseparable  all  of 
man's  activities  are  from  his  nervous  system,  it 
is  easy  to  realise  how  infinitely  rich  is  the  pos- 
sessor of  the  nervous  temperament.  Give  the 
dullard  his  comforts;  the  world's  work,  the  am- 
bitions of  men,  the  joys,  the  beauties  and  mas- 
teries of  life  are  possessed  by  those  of  keen,  ac- 
tive, nervous  organisation.  Let  no  one  so  blest 
ever  decry  his  heritage.  True  it  is  that  side  by 
side  with  the  finest  capacity  for  conceiving, 
accomplishing  and  enjoying,  abides  the  keenest 
capacity  for  suffering.  But  it  is  for  us  to  realise 
that  the  latter  stands  for  unnecessary  disorder 
in  the  operation  of  nervous  action — that  greatest 
expression  of  human  vital  force,  that  incompar- 
able gift  to  mankind. 

Nature  of  Nervousness. — It  is  impossible  to 
conceive  such  a  complex  and  highly  organised 
capacity  without  recognising  its  inherent  tendency 
to  disorder.  This  disorder  of  the  nervous 
mechanism  has  for  years  been  loosely  styled 
"nervousness,"  " neurotic "  being  the  scientific 
term  for  one  so  afflicted.  A  study  of  the  many 
possible  deviations  from  normal  nervous  activity 
makes  it  clear  that  two  departures  from  the  nor- 
mal include  practically  all  the  nervous.  Nervous 
activity  becomes  the  disease  "  nervousness  "  when 


14    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

it  is  misdirected  or  when  it  is  overactive.  Man 
was  endowed  with  reason  to  direct  his  choice  of 
objects  to  which  his  mind  should  respond.  Bea- 
son,  the  mind's  great  counsellor,  selects  from  the 
multitude  the  object  of  each  moment's  attention. 
In  the  nervous,  waste,  injury  and  hurt  are  con- 
stantly occurring  because  the  mind  has  not  fol- 
lowed the  direction  of  reason,  but  rather  the  coun- 
sel of  fear,  enmity  or  desire,  or  has  drifted  upon 
damaging  quick-sands,  guided  only  by  instinct. 
Nervous  activity  misdirected  is  as  common  as 
human  life.  We  all  turn  at  times  from  reason's 
calm,  often  colourless,  counsel,  led  by  the  rain-' 
bow  or  midnight  of  our  emotions.  A  certain 
amount  of  emotionalism  is  possible  to  the  average 
person  without  lasting  damage,  but  to  all  who 
surrender  and  allow  perverted  nervous  action  to 
become  a  habit,  the  penalty  of  wasted  and  misused 
vital  energy  will  assert  itself  as  " nervousness." 
Such  a  penalty  is  paid  by  him  who  allows  his  life 
to  be  controlled  by  moods.  Such  is  the  cost,  in 
human  strength  and  happiness,  of  surrender  to 
fear.  A  life  of  emotional  riot  inevitably  invites 
the  depths  of  nervous  discomfort. 

Man  was  given  a  will  to  choose,  control  and 
limit  his  nervous  expenditure.  While  the  reason 
may  select  and  give  direction  to  thought  and  feel- 
ing responses,  it  is  the  will  that  gives  to  these 
responses  the  force  necessary  to  success,  or,  in 
its  deficient  action,  allows  desire,  impulse  or  feel- 
ing to  urge  nervous  action  on  to  damaging,  ex- 
hausting and  even  destroying  extremes.  Uncon- 
trolled nervous  activity,  even  when  directed  as 


WHAT  IS  NERVOUSNESS?  15 

advised  by  reason,  may  wreck  itself  through 
overintensity  or  exhaust  itself  through  overindul- 
gence. 

In  studying  the  nature  of  "  nervousness, "  we 
must  dispel  the  common  error  that  it  is  a  disorder 
of  the  nerves.  The  nerves  are  mere  insensate 
cords,  carrying  impressions  to  and  from  the  brain. 
All  of  man's  infinite  responses  take  place,  not  in 
his  nerves,  but  in  his  central  nervous  system. 
Mind,  not  nerves,  is  at  fault.  Nervous  health 
is  a  mental  state,  not  a  physical  condition.  We 
shall  find  that  physical  disturbances  play  a  large 
part  in  the  production  of  nervousness;  we  shall 
also  find  that  normal  reason  and  will  can  face 
extremes  of  physical  suffering  without  surrender. 
Many  of  the  mistaken  ideas  connected  with  nerv- 
ousness are  easily  displaced  when  we  consider 
the  intimate  relation  of  mind  and  body.  The 
body's  organs  are  constantly  influenced  by  the 
mind  through  what  is  called  the  sympathetic  nerv- 
ous system.  The  relation  between  mind  and  body 
is  so  active,  and  the  nervous  system  so  able  to 
record  an  infinite  variety  of  sensations,  that  the 
sufferer  finds  dire  confusion  in  distinguishing 
nervous  discomforts  from  those  produced  by 
mechanical  or  chemical  injuries  to  the  tissues  or 
organs  of  his  body.  When  it  is  realised  that  there 
is  a  nervous  counterpart  for  every  organic  dis- 
ease; that  no  form  of  physical  damage  exists 
which  is  not  imitated  and  reproduced  by  sensa- 
tions practically  identical  with  those  accompany- 
ing the  organic  disease,  it  is  easy  to  understand 
the  immense  variety  of  nervous  symptoms  and 


16    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

the  practically  unlimited  manifestations  of  nerv- 
ous discomfort.  To  repeat,  nervousness  is  a 
disease  of  numberless  possible  expressions. 
There  is  no  form  of  illness,  pain,  distress,  prac- 
tically no  alteration  in  circulation,  no  disturbance 
in  the  various  processes  of  digestion,  no  disease 
of  the  respiratory  organs — indeed,  no  defective 
bodily  function — which  a  highly-wrought,  dis- 
ordered nervous  system  may  not  imitate.  Sen- 
sations as  varied  as  the  scale  of  human  capacity 
for  feeling,  sensations  apparently  recording  dis- 
turbances in  a  dozen  organs,  may  one  and  all  be 
but  expressions  of  an  overresponsive  brain. 
With  this  conception,  from  the  almost  hopeless 
tangle  of  nervous  sensations  emerges  the  com- 
forting truth,  that  when  the  central  nervous  sys- 
tem is  restored  to  normal,  all  will  be  well.  The 
brain,  itself  insensible,  reflects  its  discomforts  to  a 
thousand  nooks  of  the  body,  and  its  ill  mind  blames 
every  one  of  its  co-workers  with  wrong-doing. 
Nervousness,  then,  is  truly  a  mental,  not  a  physi- 
cal, illness.  Nervousness  represents  a  high  ca- 
pacity for  response  to  external  and  internal 
stimuli,  with  lack  of  selective  and  inhibitory  con- 
trol. 


CHAPTEE  III 
TYPES  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

As  we  have  already  seen,  disturbances  of  the 
central  nervous  system  manifest  themselves  in  an 
infinite  variety  of  responses.  These  responses 
produce  numerous  types  of  nervous  sufferers,  no 
two  being  identical,  as  no  two  individuals  are 
identical;  yet,  like  individuals,  the  nervous  types 
are  conveniently  and  rather  easily  grouped.  Our 
understanding  of  nervous  disorders  will  be  sim- 
plified through  an  insight  into  their  most  com- 
monly observed  forms. 

The  most  conspicuous  of  all  nervous  sufferers 
belong  to  the  so-called  motor  type.  In  this  form 
of  the  disorder  constant  restlessness  is  the  rule. 
It  would  seem  that  those  parts  of  the  brain  which 
control  muscular  activity  are  in  an  extremely 
overactive  state,  and  constant  misdirected  energy 
in  the  form  of  useless,  often  purposeless,  move- 
ments, attracts  the  attention  of  all  observers. 
The  patient's  inability  to  control  this  waste  of 
energy  discloses  the  helplessness  of  his  will. 
Most  persons  of  nervous  temperament  are  con- 
stantly losing  more  or  less  energy  through  some 
of  the  many  useless,  wasteful  habits  of  action. 
Few  of  us  converse  without  an  accompaniment 
of  chair-rocking  or  foot- jerking,  grimace  of  face 
or  extravagant  gesture  of  hands.  The  average 

17 


18    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

school-child  in  writing  his  lesson  expends  far 
more  energy  with  his  tongue  and  face  and  feet 
than  with  his  fingers.  Our  young  lady  has  be- 
come well  trained  in  the  better  social  customs 
when,  even  in  public,  she  does  not  handle  her  face, 
pull  at  her  gloves,  repeatedly  adjust  her  neck- 
dress,  tuck  up  imaginary  strands  of  hair,  and 
finger  and  fumble  her  ornaments.  These  are  but 
minor  expressions  of  this  form  of  the  disorder, 
which  includes  many  more  seriously  exhausting 
habits  of  useless  movement,  notably  the  tics  or 
so-called  " habit  spasms."  Under  the  influence 
of  these,  strength-wasting  shrugging  of  shoulders, 
twisting  of  necks,  tugging  of  moustache  or  twitch- 
ing of  face  continue  year  after  year  in  hopeless 
efforts  to  adjust  body  or  clothing.  These,  and 
many  like  wasteful  actions,  become  such  inveterate 
habits  as  to  make  life  totally  wretched  if  the  com- 
pelling impulsions  to  repeat  and  ever  repeat  the 
movements  are  not  humoured.  Nervous  activity 
has  become  overactive — damagingly  and  exhaust- 
ingly  so.  In  the  most  extreme  forms  of  this 
variety  of  weakness,  the  patient  becomes  entirely 
incapacitated  for  purposeful  action,  all  his 
strength  and  attention  being  expended  in  a  chaos 
of  useless  doing. 

The  hypersensitive  nervous  type  is  the  most 
common.  In  these  sufferers,  reason  fails  to  select 
wisely,  and  as  a  result  the  victim  responds  more 
and  more  constantly,  not  by  action,  but  by  feel- 
ing, to  useless  and  wasteful  sensations.  Many 
" would-be"  aristocrats  pride  themselves  upon 
their  sensitive  nature.  Their  feelings  are  too 


TYPES  OF  NERVOUSNESS  19 

delicate  for  vulgar  contact.  True  sensitiveness  is 
one  of  the  finest  strains  of  character.  It  knows 
no  selfish  discriminations.  True  sensitiveness 
responds  eternally  and  unselfishly  to  human  good- 
ness and  human  need.  But  it  is  not  so  with  the 
unhappy  hypersensitive.  He  suffers  from  con- 
stantly enlarging  varieties  of  contact.  Each 
change  in  the  weather  affects  his  comfort;  the 
voices  of  progress  and  industry  affect  his  rest; 
all  forms  of  physical  and  mental  discomfort  are 
avoided  as  the  plague;  the  quality  and  prepara- 
tion of  his  dinner  are  vital  to  his  evening's 
serenity;  peace  in  the  household  depends  upon  a 
slavish  observance  of  the  niceties  of  his  dominat- 
ing sensibilities.  He  is  a  veritable  slave  to  sen- 
sation, feeling  being  the  only  motive  for  doing, 
reason  being  helpless  before  the  tyrant  sensation ; 
and  will  has  long  since  surrendered  in  the  fight 
with  impulse.  So  sensitive  are  these  slaves  of 
feeling  that  the  inflection  of  the  morning  greeting, 
the  frown  or  smile,  the  misunderstood  word  or 
action,  may  be  producers  of  poignant  misery. 
Unchecked,  the  disorder  ultimately  ostracises  its 
victim  from  all  normal  concourse  and  useful 
activity.  All  life's  energies  are  spent  in  the 
avoidance  of  discomforts.  The  clock's  ticking 
must  be  stopped,  the  electric  bells  muffled,  the 
voices  of  the  children  hushed.  These  sufferers 
are  ofttimes  driven  into  obscurity,  seeking  the 
quietude  demanded  by  their  overwrought  brain 
and  sickly,  sensitive  mind.  It  is  from  this  class 
that  the  large  and  wretched  company  of  drug 
users  is  recruited,  suffering  individuals  who 


20    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

rapidly  become  the  helpless  and  hopeless  victims 
of  drug  and  drink,  and  finally,  miserably  wretched, 
dangerous  dregs  of  humanity. 

The  suggestible  type  is  also  common.  Sug- 
gestibility, or  the  capacity  of  being  influenced 
by  feeling  rather  than  by  reason,  is  normal  in 
childhood  before  reason  has  developed,  and  it  is 
purely  an  individual  matter  as  to  the  degree  of 
control  reason  will  ultimately  assume.  Accur- 
ately considered,  the  suggestible  type  represents 
a  failure  of  reason  to  attain  masterful  develop- 
ment. In  the  normal,  full-grown  mind,  reason 
weighs  all  information,  all  appeals,  all  influences, 
and  directs  choice.  In  the  suggestible  this  guid- 
ing counsel  is  secondary  to  the  demands  and  in- 
structions and  insinuations  of  the  emotions. 

Damaging  suggestion  may  come,  as  it  usually 
does,  from  without.  The  patent  medicine  adver- 
tisement, with  its  vivid  descriptions  of  disease, 
creates  an  impression  so  strong  in  the  suggestible 
mind  as  to  stimulate  the  subconscious  and  produce 
symptoms  which  sooner  or  later  appear  to  the 
conscious  mind  as  the  identical  or  a  kindred 
disease.  Herein  abides  the  power  of  "  cure-alls  " 
to  suggest  dollars  from  the  pockets  of  the  sug- 
gestible. Newspaper  reproductions  of  vicious 
and  impossible  creatures  labelled  "germs,"  impel 
the  fearsome  housewife  to  besprinkle  her  goods 
and  chattels  with  vile-smelling  disinfectants,  even 
to  the  neglect  of  wholesome,  health-saving  cleanli- 
ness. The  scarlet  fever  placard,  flaming  forth  its 
warning  from  the  house  front,  sends  the  suggest- 
ible to  the  opposite  side  of  the  street,  where,  with 


TYPES  OF  NERVOUSNESS  21 

face  averted  and  breathing  suspended,  they  pro- 
tect themselves  from  impossible  dangers. 

In  another  form  of  suggestibility,  termed  auto- 
suggestion, the  patient  is  influenced  by  impres- 
sions originating  within  his  own  mind.  The 
discomforts  of  an  illness  of  many  years  ago  may 
be  unconsciously  treasured  in  the  memory,  and 
as  the  result  of  depression  following  some  dis- 
appointment or  sorrow,  or  through  the  disturbing 
influence  of  some  shock  or  fear,  the  painful  sen- 
sation may  be  resurrected  from  memory,  and 
reconstructed  in  the  mind  as  a  return  of  the  old 
disorder.  Many  quite  normal  individuals  will 
sicken,  and  at  times  even  vomit,  by  simply  re- 
calling some  nauseating  experience  or  scene  of  the 
far  past.  In  hysteria,  which  is  the  typical  form 
of  nervous  disorder  in  which  suggestibility  is  the 
basis,  there  is  absolutely  no  known  physical 
disease  which  is  not  counterfeited,  mimicked, 
reproduced  in  the  sensations  of  the  sufferer. 
The  modern  physician  in  treating  this  disorder 
searches  the  patient 9s  mentality  for  the  damaging 
root  idea,  which  has  occasioned  the  emotional  dis- 
turbances— fear,  anxiety,  apprehension  or  what 
may  be,  which  are  the  basis  of  the  physical  sensa- 
tions interpreted  by  the  patient  as  true  disease 
of  the  body.  Suggestibility  unchecked  may  reach 
a  degree  of  intensity  in  which  reason  is  helpless 
and  will  absolutely  without  effect,  in  which  the  suf- 
ferer becomes  a  vapid  puppet  of  weird,  demoralis- 
ing, disintegrating  sensations,  bred  simply  in  his 
own  mind.  We  are  tempted  to  speak  of  hysterical 
symptoms  as  being  imaginary  disorders ;  we  must 


22    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

realise,  however,  that  they  are  disorders  of  the 
imagination. 

In  our  modern  life  with  its  rapidly  lessening 
demand  for  physical  activity,  muscular  develop- 
ment and  strength  and  resistance  are  becoming 
increasingly  defective.  The  demands  upon  our 
nervous  energies  and  responses  have  multiplied 
a  thousandfold  since  the  quiet  days  of  our  grand- 
fathers. Physiology  tells  us  that  all  forms  of 
fatigue  are  essentially  mental.  Prone  to  think 
that  our  muscles  are  tired,  we  often  sink  down 
expressing  complete  exhaustion.  A  sudden  dan- 
ger puts  strength  and  speed  into  our  momentarily 
sense-wearied  frame;  a  life-saving  emergency 
develops  capacity  for  effort  which  we  are  apt  to 
call  '  '  superhuman. ' '  We  were  not  exhausted ;  we 
felt  that  we  were.  Fatigue  is  practically  always 
nervous.  Most  of  the  fatigue  and  exhaustion  so 
common  to-day  is  not  produced  by  physical  effort, 
but  results  from  emotional  wear  and  tear,  friction 
and  waste. 

Modern  days  are  producing  an  increasingly 
large  number  of  those  who  suffer  from  undue 
fatigability.  The  neurologist  speaks  of  this  form 
of  nervous  inadequacy  as  neurasthenia.  In  an 
analysis  of  the  neurasthenic  type  we  rarely  find 
the  individual  suffering  damaging  fatigue  through 
the  calm,  masterful  carrying  out  of  a  reasonably 
.selected  course  of  activity.  Emotional  waste  is 
/the  most  rapidly  fatiguing  and  exhausting  of  all 
forms  of  effort.  A  physically  frail  woman  may 
suddenly  develop  acute  mania,  and  for  hours  and 
days  and  weeks  keep  up  an  almost  ceaseless 


TYPES  OF  NERVOUSNESS  23 

activity,  expending  a  hundred  foot-tons  of  energy 
daily  to  each  ten  she  apparently  possessed  before 
her  illness,  such  endurance  being  spoken  of  as 
the  "  superhuman  power  of  the  maniac. "  Truly 
nothing  has  been  added  to  her  strength !  But  in- 
sanely unconscious  of  the  sensations  of  fatigue, 
insanely  intent  on  carrying  out  her  irrational 
activity,  she  expends  power  which  in  her  normal 
state  was  unknown.  The  sufferer  from  fatig- 
ability  of  the  neurasthenic  type  is  a  victim  of 
disorder  of  energy,  usually  involving  the  growth 
and  training  of  will.  Even  more  frequently,  the 
fatigable  type  develops  from  the  basis  of  over- 
sensitiveness  to  the  normal  discomforts  of  fatigue. 

Probably  no  form  of  nervousness  has  become 
so  popular  as  neurasthenia.  Pronounced  neuras- 
thenia, it  is  indeed  quite  an  aristocratic  disorder. 
Many  men  and  women  of  usefulness  and  ability, 
usually  living  in  unconscious  violation  of  the  laws 
of  nervous  health,  date  numerous  events  of  their 
life's  calendar  in  relation  to  their  first,  third  or 
fifth  nervous  breakdown.  Many  neurotics,  con- 
sciously or  unconsciously  shrewd,  are  able  to 
secure  periodic  vacations,  comfortably  spent 
under  hospital  or  sanitarium  care,  or  a  long  rest 
at  some  health  resort,  through  an  opportune 
breakdown  of  this  type.  The  time  is  rapidly  com- 
ing when  the  uselessness  of  such  lapses  from 
productiveness  will  be  regarded  with  the  same 
sense  of  shame  as  an  attack  of  typhoid  fever  or 
other  preventable  filth-borne  disease. 

The  hypochondriac  presents  quite  a  difficult 
type  of  nervousness.  His  selection  of  reaction 


24    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

subjects  (for  he  is  usually  masculine)  is  prac- 
tically limited  to  those  relating  to  his  own  body, 
and  upon  these  subjects  he  reacts  most  actively, 
constantly  and  consistently.  The  stomach  is  the 
organ  most  frequently  selected.  We  all  have  a 
certain  hazy  consciousness  of  what  is  occurring  in 
this  section  of  our  digestive  apparatus,  but  the 
hypochondriac  studies  its  every  mood.  "Too 
much  acid"  to-day,  "too  sluggish "  to-morrow, 
again  "overactive"  and  later  "turning  every- 
thing into  gas."  This  usually  innocent  offender, 
which  would  attend  to  its  own  business  very 
efficiently  if  let  alone,  furnishes  food  for  thought, 
attention,  converse,  fear  and  despair  through 
many  of  the  hypochondriac's  waking  hours. 
Again  the  heart  may  be  the  object  of  his  attentive 
devotion,  and  he  becomes  a  chronic  pulse-feeler, 
stopping  in  the  midst  of  his  meal  to  see  if  the 
last  swallow  of  ice-water  was  not  overstimulating, 
or  does  not  threaten  to  suddenly  paralyse  the 
action  of  this  faithful  servant.  Or  the  eyes  may 
be  subject  to  repeated  scrutiny,  and  their  normal 
actions  misinterpreted.  They  "have  an  unnat- 
ural look,"  "the  pupils  are  too  large,"  he  "knows 
they  are  wrong,"  even  after  painstaking  exam- 
inations by  experts  have  failed  to  reveal  any 
abnormality.  The  various  excretions  and  secre- 
tions of  the  body  are  studied  with  infinite  care, 
and  abnormal  importance  laid  on  the  normal 
manifestations  of  healthy  bodily  activity,  to 
many  of  which  are  ascribed  an  import  and  signi- 
ficance absolutely  unknown  to  science.  The  hypo- 
chondriac's will  is  thoroughly  active  in  the 


TYPES  OF  NERVOUSNESS  25 

defence  of  his  preconceived  ideas,  and  his  con- 
fidence in  his  own  opinion  is  so  vain  and  deter- 
mined that  he  will  defy  the  hopeful  opinions  of 
a  score  of  physicians  as  to  his  recovery. 

The  self-centred  type  of  nervous  illness  is 
clearly  marked  in  many  cases.  Self-centredness 
is  very  prone  to  deface  the  character  of  all  nerv- 
ous sufferers;  reasonably  so,  for  the  source  of 
the  suffering  is  a  perverted  self.  Perhaps  no 
type  of  human  illness  so  inevitably  produces  the 
bore  as  this  form  of  sickness.  Eeason  and  will 
are  derailed.  Petty,  selfish  interests  and  the 
concerns  of  self,  contract  and  narrow,  even  to 
deformity,  lives  of  brilliant  promise.  Self-atten- 
tion blocks  the  efforts  of  reason  to  go  afield  for 
the  material  of  new  interests.  Will  is  inevitably 
weakened  in  the  face  of  devitalising  self-pity, 
contracting  self-study,  and  demoralising  self- 
interest.  In  this  self-centred  group  are  found  the 
conceited  neurotics  who  exalt  their  symptoms  as 
true  divinities  which  they  worship  in  and  out  of 
season.  They  are  capable  of  instantly  waxing 
eloquent  on  the  endless  details  of  their  illnesses, 
ever  asserting  their  claims  of  suffering  superior- 
ity even  as  they  might  enlarge  on  virtues  won 
through  a  life  of  sacrifice.  The  conceited 
neurotic  insists  that  there  never  was  a  case  like 
his;  that  medical  science  has  never  witnessed 
suffering  such  as  his  and  with  just  his  set  of 
symptoms.  Conceited  sufferers  they  are,  who 
frequently  are  quite  satisfied  to  remain  so,  and 
continue  to  seek  counsel,  unsatisfied,  until  they  do 
find  the  physician  who  admits  that  he  never  saw 


26    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

a  like  case.  While  in  fact  he  is  usually  the  ordi- 
nary, self-satisfied,  self-centred  neurotic,  as  com- 
mon to  the  nerve  specialist  as  toothaches  to  the 
dentist.  These  patients  are  visibly  restless  in  the 
face  of  any  discussion  or  activity  which  does  not 
allow  them  self-expression  of  self.  Many  of  the 
manifestations  of  nervousness  are  so  selfish,  so 
crude,  so  ignorant,  as  to  call  forth  impatience, 
or  at  best  to  excite  only  charitable  pity. 

There  remains  one  class  of  the  nervous,  how- 
ever, to  whom  a  certain  homage  should  be  given 
— those  who,  through  a  determined,  but  unfor- 
tunate, overactive  expression  of  the  will,  develop 
abnormal  repression.  The  repressed  nervous 
type  suffers  acutely  but  silently,  without  demon- 
stration or  effort  to  attract  attention.  Frequently 
calm  in  the  midst  of  turmoil,  hubbub,  strife,  often 
very  efficient  under  conditions  in  which  others  lose 
self-control,  these  silent  sufferers  deserve  high 
respect.  The  energy  leak  goes  on  for  years. 
The  mind  is  literally  feeding  upon  itself,  but  the 
control  remains  apparently  unbroken,  until  finally 
the  tension  exceeds  endurance,  and  a  hysterical 
or  neurasthenic  outbreak  reveals  the  effects  of  the 
years  of  repression.  Even  in  this  type,  however, 
careful  mental  analysis  will  show  that  there  have 
long  been  unwise  or  unworthy  intellectual  or 
emotional  reactions,  producing  chronic  energy 
leakage.  The  considerate,  determined  efforts  at 
mastery  place  the  repressed  nervous  patient  on  a 
distinctly  higher  plane  than  the  average  self- 
pitying,  attention-craving,  responsibility-avoid- 
ing, sympathy-demanding,  self-centred  neurotic. 


CHAPTEE  IV 
GETTING  BEADY  TO  BE  NEBVOUS 

Heredity. — Does  an  enemy  stand  at  the  portal 
through  which  humankind  enters  upon  life,  an 
enemy  who  is  willing  to  brand  one  child  out  of 
three  with  tendencies  and  weaknesses  which  may 
later  result  in  nervous  wreckage?  It  would  so 
seem,  for  parents  not  only  pass  to  their  children 
hue  of  skin,  contour  of  face  and  limit  of  stature, 
but  mental  characteristics  and  tendencies,  abilities 
and  defects,  dispositions  and  temperaments. 
Powers  and  weaknesses  which  lead  on  to  success- 
ful independence  or  to  nervous  disaster  may  be 
traced  through  succeeding  generations.  The 
Mendelian  law  of  heredity  finds  accurate  fulfil- 
ment in  the  mental  as  well  as  the  physical 
characteristics  of  descent.  It  is  not  alone  his 
personal  heritage  that  a  man  is  capable  of  trans- 
mitting to  his  offspring,  but  also  certain  weak- 
nesses and  powers  which  he  has  himself  acquired 
— weaknesses  and  powers  quite  independent  of 
those  he  received  from  his  parents ;  these  too  may 
be  passed  on  as  factors  determining  the  weal  or 
woe  of  his  children. 

A  few  diseases,  practically  always  the  result  of 
some  form  of  self-indulgence  in  the  parent,  may 
reappear  in  the  second  and  even  the  third  genera- 

27 


28    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

tion.  Too  much  emphasis  cannot  be  placed  on 
the  fact  that  the  damage  man  does  through  intem- 
perance in  certain  of  his  indulgences  is  not  limited 
to  its  effects  upon  himself,  but  these  weaknesses 
find  expression  in  the  multiplied  miseries  and 
erratic,  defective  nervous  systems  of  his  children 
and  grandchildren.  These  innocent  victims  are 
condemned  before  birth  to  live  with  nervous 
systems  attuned  to  discord,  nervous  systems  at 
best  capable  of  expressing  life  only  through  minor 
strains,  and  often  hopelessly  deficient  in  capacity 
for  whole-souled  chords  of  joy  or  paeans  of  vic- 
tory, pitiable,  depressed,  morbid,  blighted  lives. 
None  of  us  is  responsible  for  the  heritage  he  re- 
ceives from  his  forebears;  all  of  us  are  everlast- 
ingly responsible  for  the  use  we  make  and  the 
care  we  take  of  that  heritage,  and  when  we 
increase  its  perversity  and  double  its  power  to 
damage  the  flesh  of  our  flesh,  we  sell  the  most 
sacred  responsibility  of  our  birthright  for  the 
mess  of  pottage.  Ignorance  formerly  excused 
and  still  excuses  the  ignorant;  but  while  knowl- 
edge is  rapidly  increasing,  the  strength  of  will 
to  put  that  knowledge  into  living  use  is  diminish- 
ing. 

A  few  years  ago  a  writer  on  the  question  of 
intemperance  would  have  headed  his  list  of  dam- 
aging indulgences  with  alcohol.  While  in  no  way 
discounting  the  frightful  toll  of  nervous  wreck- 
age which  alcohol  has  wrought  and  is  still  work- 
ing, the  primary  emphasis  must  be  laid  upon  a 
more  common  and  seductive  enemy.  Food  intem- 
perance is  a  larger  factor  in  producing  the  damage 


GETTING  EEADY  TO  BE  NERVOUS         29 

which  results  in  defective  nervous  offspring,  than 
any  other  single  cause.  Food  intemperance  in 
our  land  of  plenty  is  almost  universal.  Self- 
poisoning  from  overeating  produces  far  greater 
total  damage  to  nervous  health  than  overindul- 
gence in  alcohol.  Excesses  in  meats,  sweets  or 
fats,  if  habitual  and  not  neutralised  by  proper 
exercise,  will,  within  the  first  or  second  genera- 
tion, result  in  a  condition  of  overacidity,  now 
recognised  as  one  of  the  most  common  and  funda- 
mental physical  causes  of  modern  nervous  irrita- 
bility. 

Nations,  as  well  as  individuals,  are  accepting 
the  unquestioned  nervous  damage  of  alcohol,  used 
even  in  moderate  amounts.  Many  appalling  and 
unquestionably  distorted  statements  have  been 
made  to  frighten  the  drinker  from  his  cups.  But 
it  would  seem  that  when  a  committee  appointed 
by  a  government  to  investigate  the  harmful  effects 
of  alcohol,  after  an  exhaustive  study  reports  that 
the  drinker's  life  is  shortened  twenty-five  minutes 
by  every  glass  of  alcoholic  liquor,  even  the 
reckless  would  hesitate.  Six  years  are  knocked 
off  the  earthly  existence  of  the  average  regular 
drinker.  Within  his  rights,  the  tippler  answers 
that  it  is  his  own  life  that  he  is  shortening,  and 
if  he  pleases  to  so  live  and  die,  he  alone  is  hurt. 
Few  so  live  to-day  that  they  can  thus  curtail  their 
lives  without  adding  to  the  burdens  of  others. 
But  self-damage  and  ruthless  ignoring  of  kith 
and  kin  are  insignificant  when  compared  to  the 
very  mark  of  Cain  which  the  alcoholic  passes  on 
to  the  majority  of  his  children.  Three  out  of 


30    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

four  of  the  offspring  of  average  drinkers  show 
inherited  defects,  chiefly  of  the  nervous  system. 
Many  an  intense,  unhappy,  miserable,  high-strung 
neurotic  of  to-day  is  the  defective  daughter  of  a 
genial,  jovial,  easy-going,  easy-living,  old-school 
gentleman,  whose  mint  juleps  of  good  fellowship 
burn  hot  in  the  brains  of  his  children.  Numbers 
of  fearsome  epileptics  go  through  lives  of  fierce 
uncertainty,  the  unhappy  products  of  a  single 
ancestral  spree.  It  is  the  helpless  offspring,  the 
little  ones  brought  into  a  world  of  strife  and 
work,  robbed  before  birth  of  that  stability  which 
stands  for  ability,  of  that  poise  which  is  essential 
to  peace,  to  whom  the  drinking  father  or  wine- 
bibbing  mother  is  to  be  pointed.  For  the  sake 
of  their  posterity,  either  parenthood  or  alcohol  in 
any  form  must  be  denied.  No  father  or  mother 
may  indulge,  ever  so  moderately,  in  this  arch 
poison  of  the  nervous  system  with  any  certainty 
that  his  or  her  children  will  not  be  nervously 
marred. 

Excessive  use  of  tobacco,  a  habit  rapidly  grow- 
ing because  of  the  temporary  relief  which  it  gives 
to  the  increasing  nervous  tension  of  the  average 
individual,  like  chronic  food  poisoning,  can  but 
deface  the  delicate  nervous  mechanism  of  the  off- 
spring. So  the  inexorable  and .  irrevocable  laws 
of  heredity  should  never  be  forgotten  by  parents, 
even  as  they  should  never  be  remembered  by 
children,  save  as  a  spur  to  the  individual  to  stim- 
ulate him  to  unusual  efforts  in  self-knowledge  and 
self-control,  such  unusual  efforts  in  rational  living 
as  are  necessary  to  compensate  for  the  accumu- 


GETTING  BEADY  TO  BE  NERVOUS    31 

lation  of  ancestral  defects,  for  the  brand  of  the 
enemy  at  life's  portal  may  be  effaced  by  a  life 
of  such  wholeness  of  living  as  will  outweigh  the 
damning  heritage  of  ignorant  or  selfish  indul- 
gence. 

Home  Training. — Many  children  of  nervous 
parents,  if  transplanted  into  surroundings  where 
simplicity,  law  and  order  prevailed,  would  surely 
develop  into  happy,  productive  men  and  women. 

( iBut  all  too  often  the  influences  of  home  surround- 
ings are  but  a  continuation  of  the  tendencies  of 
heredity.)  The  neurotic  who  has  learned  to  live 
comfortably  and  successfully  with  himself  is  the 

^ra^B  exception.  As  a  rule,  those  defects  which 
he  has  put  into  the  blood  of  his  child  are  intensified 
by  year  after  year  of  injurious  personal  influence. 
The  family,  whether  normal  or  neurotic,  is  rare 
indeed,  in  which  true  wisdom  directs  the  new- 
comer's early  months.  In  the  average  well- 
regulated  family,  order  and  punctuality  disappear 
with  the  baby's  advent,  and  yet  for  no  one  in  the 
household  are  order  and  punctuality  more  needful. 
A  large  share  of  the  common  waste  in  care,  effort 
and  anxiety  attendant  upon  the  early  weeks  of 
parenthood  would  disappear  if  system  and  disci- 
pline were  introduced  from  the  first,  and  labour- 
saving  and  strength-giving  habits  of  eating, 
sleeping,  and  bathing  established. 

The  properly-trained  child  has  become  adjusted 
to  his  new  life  by  his  fourth  month — a  life  which 
should,  above  all  things,  stand  for  quietude  and 
simplicity.  The  overstimulation  of  useless,  dam- 
aging attentions  grows  out  of  the  average  parents ' 


32         THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

forgetfulness  that  the  little  one  has  but  recently 
arrived  from  a  land  of  sleep  arid  silence,  and  their 
ignorance  of  the  serious  facts  that  its  nervous 
system  is  as  delicate  and  subject  to  injury  as  the 
bloom  on  the  fruit,  and  that  its  needs  are  the  very 
simplest,  chief  of  which,  after  proper  feeding, 
are  weeks  and  months  of  rest  and  quiet.  The 
hours  of  prolonged  stimulations,  the  excessive 
carrying,  swinging  and  rocking,  the  feverish 
jolting  to  which  the  average  baby  is  subjected, 
are  indeed  sufficient  reason  for  many  of  the 
addled  brains  of  maturity.  By  four  months  the 
sensibly-reared  child  has  become  a  model  baby, 
comfortable  and  happy.  Too  frequently,  how- 
ever, four  months  finds  him  the  tyrant  of  the 
home,  and  tyrant  the  little  one  remains  often 
through  childhood,  until  hard  and  wholesome 
worldly  contact  displaces  his  despotism  by  a  tardy 
recognition  of  the  rights  of  others. 

The  modern  physician  gives  very  explicit  and 
earnest  directions  to  the  mother  as  to  her  child's 
feeding,  emphasising  his  admonitions  with  the 
statement  that  over  half  the  children  who  die 
from  summer  complaint  were  fed  to  death;  and, 
looking  into  the  child's  future  welfare,  he  warns 
her  that  the  seeds  of  chronic  digestive  weaknesses 
are  usually  sown  during  the  first  twelve  or  fifteen 
years  of  child-life.  He  cannot  lay  too  great  em- 
phasis upon  the  benefits,  physical  and  nervous, 
of  wise  feeding.  Wise  feeding  is  regular  feed- 
ing, is  moderate  feeding,  is  the  feeding,  of 
simple  foods,  is  the  protection  of  childhood  from 
that  long  list  of  unnecessary  ailments  and  ill- 


GETTING  BEADY  TO  BE  NERVOUS    33 

nesses  which  are  the  penalty  of  ignorant  feeding. 
Excessive  feeding  of  sweets  is  the  commonest 
temptation.  The  richer  meats,  foods  cooked  in 
grease,  and  above  all,  foods  containing  alcohol, 
should  be  denied.  For  the  very  habit  of  self- 
denial,  the  recognition  by  the  child  that  there  are 
many  things  in  life  which  are  not  for  his  earlier 
years,  is  one  of  the  fundamental  lessons  in  self- 
control  which  makes  for  safety.  On  the  other 
hand,  food  antipathies  should  be  early  combated. 
Many  scrawny,  weak,  miserable-looking  children, 
lacking  resistance  to  fight  any  serious  infection, 
are  the  irritable,  nervous  products  of  cake  and 
chocolates,  refusing  to  eat,  and  in  the  minds  of 
their  incompetent  mothers,  unable  to  eat  the 
simple,  wholesome  bone  and  blood  producing 
foods — children  starving  in  the  midst  of  plenty. 
Many  children  of  apparently  intelligent  families 
are  allowed  to  grow  into  maturity  untaught  in 
the  enjoyment  of  many  wholesome  foods,  living 
on  diets  so  limited  as  to  rob  them  constantly  of 
beneficial  food  elements.  The  parent  is  excep- 
tional to-day  who  sees  to  it  that  his  children 
learn  as  a  matter  of  course  to  eat  what  is  served, 
including  properly-cooked  cereals  and  vegetables, 
understanding  that  if  not  sufficiently  hungry  for 
plain  food  they  certainly  are  not  in  need  of  dessert. 
We  are  prone  to  allow  the  likes  and  dislikes  of 
our  children  to  run  riot,  not  taking  the  trouble 
to  see  that  they  are  alike  wholesome.  We  do 
not  give  them  the  benefit  of  mature  counsel,  guid- 
ing them  from  damaging  habits  of.  preference  or 
antipathy.  Likes  as  the  years  go  on  become 


34    THE  MASTEBY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

powerful  factors  in  development;  even  as  the 
simple  dislikes  of  childhood  may  grow  into  habits 
which  keep  us  from  much  that  is  good.  The  care- 
ful mother  becomes  alert  when  she  hears  her 
child's  "I  don't  like."  There  are  dislikes  to  be 
taught.  Dislike  of  damaging  influences  must  of 
necessity  be  taught,  and  taught  with  emphasis; 
but  the  more  likes  we  can  add  to  life,  the  more 
frequently  we  can  say  and  feel  "I  like,"  the 
greater  will  be  our  supply  of  comforts. 

Both  industrious  and  idle  mothers  are  apt  to 
over-protect  their  children  from  the  exactions  of 
duty.  There  is  little  danger  of  infringing  the 
child-labour  act  in  the  modern  home.  A  part  of 
the  play-life  of  even  the  three-year-old  child 
should  include  simple  duties  teaching  order.  Too 
often  the  mother,  practising  the  sin  of  unselfish- 
ness, develops  a  selfish,  idle  child,  a  child  denied 
the  lasting  benefits  of  productive  physical  activity, 
a  child  whose  mind  drifts  almost  inevitably  into 
sentimentalism  and  cheap  romanticism,  crowding 
out  common  sense  and  saving  reality.  Industry 
can  be  so  early  taught  as  to  unconsciously  become 
a  habit  which  would  set  the  seal  of  success  upon 
many  lives  now  destined  to  failure,  and  lay  the 
foundations  for  happiness  in  lives  now  haunted 
by  wretchedness. 

Exaggerated  self-love  is  as  certain  to  blast  the 
joy  of  living  as  the  midwinter  cold  to  blight  the 
bloom  of  the  hillside.  Self-love  early  infects  the 
spoiled  child  through  the  damaging  teachings  of 
doting,  selfishly  unselfish  parents — parents  lack- 
ing the  will  to  deny  their  children  those  thousand 


GETTING  READY  TO  BE  NERVOUS         35 

harmful  gifts  which  unknowing  childhood  begs; 
parents  lacking  the  self-control  to  teach  that  vital 
quality  to  their  children;  parents  too  devoid  of 
moral  courage  to  face  the  issue.  To  escape  a 
scene,  to  avoid  painful  but  wholesome  and 
strength-producing  discipline,  they  make  conces- 
sions to  their  children's  whims,  concessions  which 
early  inculcate  a  fundamental  disregard  for  law. 
All  too  frequently  the  home  is  one  of  double 
standards,  one  parent's  requirements  not  being 
supported  by  the  other,  a  disparity  rapidly  recog- 
nised by  the  average  child  and  seized  upon  by  him 
to  secure  his  own  way.  Few  elements  so  quickly 
teach  a  double  standard  of  living  in  the  child  him- 
self— one  to  meet  his  father's  requirements, 
another  for  his  mother's.  And  so,  early  in  child- 
hood, disregard  for  accuracy  and  truth  and 
disrespect  for  authority  enter  to  add  to  the  jangle 
and  conflicts  of  adjustment,  to  multiply  standards 
of  conduct,  and,  at  the  same  time,  to  lower  all 
standards. 

Another  far-reaching  home  influence,  harmful 
in  its  productiveness  of  nervous  disorders,  is  the 
unwise  management  by  parents  of  the  inevitable 
little  pains  incident  to  childhood  hurts.  There 
are  pains*— big  ones — to  which  every  worthy  par- 
ent will  give  quick  and  feeling  sympathy,  but  the 
large  number  of  little  pains  and  minor  discomforts 
of  daily  bumps,  falls  and  knocks,  are  usually 
weakly  and  even  harmfully  utilised;  whereas 
each  one  of  them  should  be  an  opportunity  for 
growth  of  control,  development  of  resistance  and 
means  of  strength.  The  average  nervous  house- 


36    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

hold  lives  on  the  qui  vive,  ready  to  jump  and  rush 
to  the  rescue  in  response  to  every  wail;  and  ten- 
sion begets  tension,  and  attention  begets  wails. 
Such  harmful  care  can  only  develop  exaggeration, 
and  the  cries  multiply,  often  becoming  more  and 
more  unreasonable  under  the  influence  of  this 
injudicious  attention.  The  true  sympathy  that 
saves  is  the  sympathy  which  breeds  early  self- 
help  in  the  child,  and  few  more  valuable  lessons 
are  taught  our  children  than  those  which  lead 
them  to  rub  their  own  bumps,  to  extricate  them- 
selves from  their  own  little  difficulties,  and 
through  all  to  acquire  a  tolerance  of  the  disagree- 
able. All  must  meet  with  difficulties.  The  aver- 
age child  is  so  protected  as  to  consider  a  difficulty 
a  disaster.  The  properly-reared  child  learns  to 
meet  the  disagreeable  as  a  matter  of  course,  a 
thing  to  be  faced  and  overcome.  Children  so 
trained  early  develop  a  reserve  of  control  suffi- 
cient to  put  many  of  their  elders  to  shame. 

All  children  are  unconscious  imitators.  Just 
as  during  childhood  days  we  are  particularly 
prone  to  infection  by  contagious  diseases,  so 
are  all  children  subject  to  psychic  infection. 
Impatience,  irritability  and  injustice  are  dis- 
tinctly damaging  influences,  influences  which  shock 
the  delicate  sensibilities  of  youth.  Yet  they 
are  defects  of  conduct  early  acquired,  defects 
which  may  become  habitual  long  before  ma- 
turity, and  which  are  almost  vitally  damaging 
to  nervous  stability.  These  infections  produce  a 
fundamental  hurt,  essentially  productive  of  nerv- 
ous disorder.  They  stand  for  overreaction  to 


GETTING  READY  TO  BE  NERVOUS         37 

inadequate  causes,  and  when  this  habit  has  become 
fixed,  it  proves  a  constant  drain  upon  nervous 
vitality. 

Fear  is  absolutely  necessary  in  the  development 
of  the  normal  mind :  fear  of  that  which  will  harm, 
fear  of  filth  or  evil.  But  the  great  mass  of  fear 
found  in  the  mind  of  the  average  child  is  but  a 
damaging  possession,  the  result  of  ignorant  or 
vicious  or  heartless  training.  Childhood  fears 
are  not  instinctive.  They  are  all  acquired.  The 
child  does  not  dread  the  fire  until  he  has  been 
burned.  The  little  one  knows  nothing  of  the 
terrors  of  the  dark  until  some  enemy  of  his  peace 
has  disturbed  his  rightful  faith  and  serenity  with 
imaginary  horrors.  It  is  just  as  easy  to  teach  a 
child  love  for  insects  and  the  harmless  creeping 
and  crawling  things  of  nature  as  to  fill  its  mind 
with  useless  and  harmful  dreads  and  antipathies. 
Every  parent  should  be  alert  to  know  his  chil- 
dren's fears,  and  quick  to  dispel  all  vagueness 
and  to  explain  away  all  imaginary  sources  of 
terror.  He  should  teach  his  child  to  face  his 
fears,  to  love  the  dark,  to  sleep  alone,  and  to  feel 
that  the  unknown  world  is  peopled  with  spirits 
of  the  good  and  not  of  evil.  The  fear-distraught 
child  is  the  child  of  careless,  ignorant  or  heart- 
less home  training. 

The  parents'  influence  in  developing  the  moral 
element  in  the  child-life  is  profound.  There  are 
two  hurtful  extremes.  To  evolve  a  wholesome 
thought-life,  all  influences  which  tend  to  the  de- 
velopment of  the  spirit  of  malevolence  must  be 
thoughtfully  avoided.  The  wise  parent  will  never 


38    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

allow  his  child  to  hear  unkind  criticism  or  com- 
ment of  any  one.  Child  nature  may  early  be 
influenced  to  think  evil;  to  think  evil  is  to  feel 
evil,  and  to  feel  evil  is  to  have  within  a  bit  of  soul- 
poison.  The  other  extreme,  while  far  less  offen- 
sive in  its  results,  is  equally  damaging  to  the 
individual.  Unbending  rigidity  in  training,  a 
relentless  hectoring  of  the  child-life  with  rules 
and  regulations,  and  permitting  no  development 
of  personality,  if  it  does  not  produce  an  ultimate 
dare-devil  recklessness,  will  result  in  a  morbid 
conscientiousness  which  stands  for  unending 
strife  and  fear.  Such  conscientiousness  produces 
unrelenting  self-analysis,  checks  real  growth, 
warps  and  contracts  and  narrows  the  joy  of  life. 
A  taste  of  liberty,  a  bit  of  license,  a  wee  bit  of 
wrong-doing  make  for  ultimate  salvation. 

Education.— Sooner  or  later,  the  influence  of 
parents  is  shared  by  the  teacher,  and  a  rich 
opportunity  is  given  him  to  impress  the  benefits 
of  his  own  personality  upon  his  students.  Dull 
or  perverted  indeed  is  the  pupil  who  does  not  feel 
the  keen,  moving  stimulation  of  some  early 
teacher's  influence,  and  unfortunate  indeed  is  the 
scholar  who  cannot  look  back  on  one  or  more  of 
his  teachers  as  having  slipped  into  his  character 
some  principles  which  have  stood  and  continue 
to  stand  for  a  stronger,  better  self.  Inevitably, 
unless  he  is  hopelessly  defective,  as  the  child 
associates  at  school  with  a  score  or  more  of  others 
representing  a  wide  variety  of  home  training, 
consciously  or  unconsciously  he  is  drawn  toward 
staple  habits  of  conduct  and  thought.  Influence 


GETTING  READY  TO  BE  NERVOUS    39 

of  child  upon  child  and  teacher  upon  all  is  potent 
for  good  or  evil.  The  very  fact  that  one  attempts 
to  teach  presupposes  a  special  preparation  and 
ability  for  wholesome,  strengthening  child-train- 
ing; but  the  common  ignorance  of  educators  in 
schools  and  academies,  and  even  in  colleges,  of 
the  fundamental  laws  governing  normal  mental 
development,  and  especially  of  those  equally 
fundamental  laws  which  underlie  mental  disorder, 
is  appalling.  Children  of  a  certain  grade  are 
forced  to  attain  certain  standards,  are  forced  into 
a  certain  mould,  and  expected  to  be  transformed 
thereby.  Individual  needs  and  defects,  heredi- 
tary tendencies,  and  the  weaknesses  of  faulty 
home  training  are  but  vaguely  recognised.  It  is 
"Make  your  grade, "  " Attain  this  standard, "  at 
any  cost,  and  the  teacher  who  is  able  to  pass  the 
largest  percentage  of  his  students  is  accorded 
best,  even  though  his  pupils  may  have  been  stim- 
ulated and  forced  by  rewards  or  demerits  to  build 
upon  defective  foundations. 

The  higher  the  grades,  the  more  intense  is  the 
forcing  process.  In  high  school,  and  more  decid- 
edly in  college,  many  pupils  are  mechanically 
grinding  through  their  tasks,  remembering 
masses  of  facts  for  examination  day.  Straining, 
struggling  and  striving  in  the  face  of  hazy  mental 
living,  many  students  acquire  a  stitfce  of  super- 
ficial knowledge,  and  at  the  same  time  damage 
their  minds  through  chronic  mental  indigestion, 
an  indigestion  which  can  only  produce  an  early 
mental  exhaustion;  inattention  alternates  with 
spasmodic  spurts  of  strained  attention,  as  the 


40    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

pupil  victim  ebbs  and  flows  onward  through  his 
forced  process  of  learning.  In  the  system  in 
vogue  throughout  our  land,  facts  are  piled  upon 
facts,  instead  of  careful,  rational  teaching  of 
principles  and  insisting  upon  the  development  of 
reason  and  not  of  mechanical  memory,  of  the 
acquisition  of  truth  and  not  the  accumulation  of 
knowledge.  There  is  much  education  which  does 
not  educate ;  education  which  crams  the  mind  with 
glittering  superficialities  and  generalities;  educa- 
tion which  under  analysis  shows  defect  after 
defect  in  mental  construction;  education  which 
does  not  develop  the  will  and  reason,  which  stand 
for  strength  and  character,  for  truth  and  resist- 
ance. There  is  education  which  all  too  often 
breeds  an  excess  of  individualism,  based  upon  a 
snobbery  of  learning.  The  burden  of  education 
is  increasing  with  the  years,  with  the  multipli- 
cation of  sciences  and  the  demands  of  educators 
who,  in  their  pride  of  scholastic  standards,  have 
long  since  forgotten  the  needs  of  the  scholar,  and 
ignorantly  or  arbitrarily  employ  methods  which 
are  not  only  multiplying  our  neurotics,  but  are 
increasing  the  proportion  of  the  insane  holding 
college  degrees  at  an  alarming  rate.  Much  edu- 
cation, especially  in  our  higher  women's  col- 
leges, stands  for  an  intensity  of  application,  for 
prodigious  expenditure  of  unrelenting  effort 
through  the  formative  years  of  life,  carried  out 
in  utter  disregard  of  the  individual  needs  or  weak- 
nesses of  the  student.  As  a  result,  thousands  of 
inadequate  minds  are  annually  being  sacrificed 
on  the  altar  of  higher  education. 


CHAPTER  V 
EATING  ERRORS 

Relation  of  Food  to  Body, — There  are  a  few 
conditions  in  the  individual's  life  which  he  is 
powerless  to  modify,  or  at  best  is  limited  in  his 
ability  to  control.  Man  is  a  passive  being  from 
the  viewpoint  of  his  heredity  and  the  influence 
of  his  earlier  surroundings.  Otherwise  he  is,  or 
should  be,  his  own  master,  and  few  there  are  who 
can  justly  contemn  Fate  for  the  total  discrepancies 
of  their  lives;  for  many  weaknesses  ascribed  to 
heredity,  and  more  deficiencies  charged  to  our 
early  training,  can  slowly  but  certainly  be 
eradicated,  supplemented,  or  adjusted  by  rational 
and  resolute  living.  In  the  chapters  which  fol- 
low, those  numerous  elements  in  the  art  of  normal 
living  which  play  an  essential  part  in  the  pro- 
duction, prevention,  or  cure  of  nervous  suffering 
will  be  practically  discussed.  In  dealing  with 
these  important,  these  vital  questions  of  living, 
the  individual  is  an  independent,  active  agent. 
In  the  large  majority  of  lives,  when  all  has  been 
said,  we  discover  that  man,  through  his  ignorance 
or  indulgence,  has  been  his  own  worst  enemy. 
But  the  laws  producing  nervousness  are  now  be- 
coming so  well  understood,  and  most  nervous 
sufferers  are  so  subject  to  distinctly  helpful  in- 
fluence, that  he  is  deficient  indeed  who  cannot 

41 


42    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

be  rescued  if  he  will  but  earnestly  and  sincerely 
learn,  and  having  learned,  honestly  and  persist- 
ently do. 

No  conception  of  man's  nervous  needs  is  ade- 
quate which  does  not  consider  his  physical,  mental 
and  moral  natures,  and  no  study  of  nervously 
suffering  man  is  just  which  does  not  recognise  the 
unity  of  his  nature,  and  the  intimate,  unceasing 
interrelation  of  body,  mind  and  soul.  In  the 
following  pages  the  essential  principles  damag- 
ingly  affecting  him  physically,  mentally  and 
morally,  with  the  fundamental  principles  upon 
which  rests  health  or  cure,  will  be  studied. 

Man's  body  is  a  marvellously  constructed 
engine.  It  takes  in  carbon  in  the  form  of  food, 
and  oxygen  through  his  lungs,  and  in  the  sub- 
stance of  the  billions  of  living  cells  which  consti- 
tute his  tissues  the  carbon  and  the  oxygen  combine 
to  produce  heat  and  energy.  In  the  healthy  body, 
the  relation  between  the  amount  of  possible  force 
in  a  given  weight  of  food  and  the  amount  of  energy 
derived  from  that  food  shows  a  perfection  of 
utilisation  which  is  the  marvel  and  the  envy  of 
the  mechanical  engineer,  unknown  in  any  man- 
made  machine.  No  other  animal  is  able  to  make 
use  of  so  large  a  variety  of  foods.  Flesh  of  beast, 
fish  and  fowl,  leaves  of  trees,  the  nests  of  birds, 
fruits  and  flowers,  roots  and  stalks,  the  juices  and 
the  oils  of  trees  and  shrubs,  the  salts  of  the  sea, 
the  minerals  of  the  earth — all  come  to  his  table; 
and  various  and  complex  manipulations  change, 
modify  and  blend  this  great  variety  of  food 
materials  into  ten  thousand  dishes  to  please  his 


EATING  ERRORS  43 

palate.  Many  men,  many  women,  many  children 
live  to  eat,  so  this  potent  engine  labours  unceas- 
ingly^never  stopping  in  some  of  its  activities 
throughout  the  entire  span  of  life — to  care  for  the 
unending  variety  of  foodstuffs  thrown  into  it  for 
its  fuel  and  its  consumption. 

Through  the  untold  ages  of  man's  history  food 
material  was  so  simple  and  limited  that  humanity 
was  forced  to  strive  and  toil  to  attain  a  sufficiency. 
The  great-grandparents  of  most  of  us  were  still 
following  the  Biblical  injunction,  and  earning 
their  bread  by  the  sweat  of  their  brows.  Of  how 
few  of  their  descendants  is  this  true  to-day,  even 
in  a  small  part!  Food  is  abundant,  and  the 
luxuries  of  a  generation  past  are  plentiful.  A 
few  syllables  uttered  to  our  servant,  Electricity, 
and  lo!  a  banquet  such  as  Solomon  in  his  glory 
never  knew,  is  before  us.  The  iced  cocktail  con- 
tains fruit  from  the  Isle  of  Pines  and  cherries 
from  Spain;  the  stock  of  the  bouillon  grew  on 
the  plains  of  Texas  and  comes  frozen  from  the 
abattoirs  of  Chicago;  the  relishes  are  from 
Kussia's  inland  seas  or  the  sunny  shores  of  Italy, 
the  fish  from  the  coasts  of  Newfoundland  or  the 
waters  of  the  Pacific;  the  fowl  was  flying  last  week 
over  the  marshes  of  the  Northwest ;  the  roast  was 
reared  with  hothouse  care  on  the  great  farms  of 
the  Middle  West;  the  punch  is  flavoured  with 
spirits  from  the  Caribbean;  the  peas  are  from 
France,  the  potatoes  from  the  far-off  State  of 
Washington,  the  corn  from  Maine;  and  the  salad 
is  prepared  from  crisp,  green  stuff  expressed 
from  Florida,  dressed  with  oils  from  France  and 


44    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

seasoned  with  condiments  from  Turkey  and 
Prussia;  fruit  has  been  brought  from  Persia, 
coffee  from  Brazil,  cigars  from  Cuba,  and  wines 
rich  and  old  from  Spain  and  the  Ehine.  Thus 
our  dinner!  And  the  sated  diner  rises  with  a 
shrug  indicating  the  commonplace.  Steam,  elec- 
tricity and  gasoline  have  brought  the  world's 
market  to  our  door,  and  poor  is  the  family  which 
does  not  daily  enjoy  foods  which  a  generation 
since  were  considered  only  possible  for  the 
wealthy.  High  living  is  becoming  a  matter  of 
course,  and  the  demands  of  the  palate  are  multi- 
plying even  faster  than  the  ability  of  art  and 
the  industry  of  commerce  to  satisfy  them. 

It  would  seem  that  only  a  miracle-working 
engine  could  select  from  this  infinite  variety  of 
foodstuffs  that  which  could  be  used  by  the  body; 
but  in  the  midst  of  this  apparent  chaos  of  intricacy 
Science  slowly  but  certainly  discloses  her  simple 
operative  laws ;  ten  thousand  foods  are  but  multi- 
ples of  four  primary  food  elements.  Scientifically 
considered,  the  digestive  apparatus  has  to  deal 
only  with  the  proteins,  such  as  meats  and  a  few 
vegetables,  including  beans;  the  carbohydrates, 
that  is,  the  various  forms  of  starch  and  sugar 
and  their  numerous  combinations ;  and  the  hydro- 
carbons, which  include  the  oils  and  fats  of  vege- 
table or  animal  source.  These  three  organic 
groups,  with  the  inorganic  substances  which  are 
called  the  salts,  and  water,  comprise  the  entire 
range  of  edibles  and  drinkables  as  seen  by  the 
eye  of  Science.  Simply  considered,  the  most  im- 
portant chemical  element  of  the  three  organic 


EATING  ERRORS  45 

groups  is  carbon.  In  the  boiler  of  the  heating 
plant,  wood,  coal,  paste-board,  leather,  rubber, 
waste  material  from  a  hundred  industries  may 
be  used  to  produce  heat.  Simply  speaking,  the 
carbon  is  the  element  which  burns.  Carbon  is  the 
chemical  which,  uniting  with  the  oxygen  of  the  air, 
produces  the  heat  to  furnish  comfort  and  power. 
And  so,  practically,  man  scours  the  seven  seas 
with  his  commerce,  haunts  the  recesses  of  the 
wilds,  ploughs  and  cultivates  and  sprays  and 
prunes  for  ten  thousand  foods,  to  the  end  that  he 
may  furnish  his  body  with  a  bit  of  carbon,  that  it 
may  be  comfortable  and  have  the  force  to  do. 
Just  as  certainly  as  the  steam  boiler  works  more 
perfectly,  produces  with  more  certainty  a  depend- 
able quantity  of  heat  and  power  when  fired  with 
wood  or  coal  than  it  possibly  can  when  stuffed 
and  cluttered  and  choked  with  the  trash  of  a  hun- 
dred industries;  so  the  human  furnace  operates 
more  perfectly  with  moderate,  simple  feeding  than 
it  possibly  can  when  stuffed  and  cluttered,  yes, 
and  poisoned  with  food-trash  of  a  hundred  prov- 
inces. 

Food  Damage. — Every  hour  of  life  the  tissues 
demand  food.  Through  many  generations  our  an- 
cestors were  forced  by  ever-impending  starvation 
to  constant  food-seeking.  Through  necessity  and 
cultivation  the  human  palate  has  become  a  gor- 
mand,  an  insatiable  gormand,  and  with  individual 
and  nation  the  days  of  plenty  have  been  days  of 
feasting,  and  gorging  is  common  at  social  festivi- 
ties of  high  and  low.  The  human  palate  knows 
not  reason.  The  puling  infant  turns  from  its 


46    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

natural  food  to  the  sugar-teat,  while  Thomas 
Parr,  one  of  England's  oldest  men,  died  a  few 
hours  after  his  152nd  birthday  dinner,-  his  king's 
guest,  from  over-eating.  Few  individuals  are  so 
blessed  with  a  protective  animal  instinct  that  they 
do  not  need  the  help  of  educated  reason  to  modify 
the  demands  of  their  palates.  True  scientific 
knowledge  of  the  value  and  harm  of  foods,  and 
the  food  needs  of  the  body  in  health  and  disease, 
is  of  but  comparatively  recent  acquisition.  The 
volume  of  suffering,  direct  and  indirect,  and  the 
toll  of  human  illness  and  death  growing  out  of 
errors  in  eating  are  too  monumental  for  com- 
prehension. Slowly,  all  too  slowly,  and  not  any 
too  surely,  the  knowledge  is  growing  that  a 
shamefully  large  proportion  of  human  ailments  is 
the  result  of  ignorance,  indifference,  or  indulgence 
in  eating;  and  all  sorts  of  remedies  are  being 
introduced.  The  shelves  of  the  pharmacist  fairly 
groan  with  digestive  aids,  tablets  and  elixirs  and 
wines  and  powders  galore,  all  intended  to  let 
greedy  man  eat  as  he  pleases,  to  relieve  him  of 
the  immediate  discomforts  of  his  gluttony,  to  put 
off  the  evil  day  of  reckoning.  Food  faddists  have 
developed  by  the  score.  There  are  meat  eaters 
— even  raw  meat  eaters — and  those  whom  eating 
meat  "doth  grievously  off  end. "  There  is  the 
uncooked  food  crank,  while  fearsome  souls  invest 
in  fireless  cookers  that  the  food  may  cook  all 
night.  Some  would  restrict  diet  to  nature's 
crude  products,  and  feed  mankind  on  fruits  and 
nuts  and  herbs,  while  others  teach  that  if  you 
will  but  chew,  and  chew,  and  chew,  it  makes  little 


EATING  ERRORS  47 

difference  what  you  chew.  Some  condense  their 
food  to  liquid  and  tablet  form,  some  to  wafers 
and  buns  guaranteed  to  educate  their  digestive 
tract  "how  to  perform;"  while  still  others  fairly 
drown  their  interiors  with  imported  waters  of 
rare  digestive  quality — all  of  which  says  eloquently 
to  him  who  thinks,  that  there  is  a  world  of  dis- 
comfort growing  out  of  the  food  question.  All 
of  these  food  faddists  could  only  exist  in  the 
presence  of  a  vastly  larger  number  of  food  errors. 
Medical  Science  has  had  so  many  problems  to 
meet — problems  involving  tragedies  of  accident, 
infection  and  death-bearing  contagion,  problems 
which  have  only  within  the  last  generation  been 
solved,  problems  which  demanded  the  best  of 
medical  skill  and  science  until  they  were  mastered 
— that  but  recently  has  she  turned  her  attention 
to  the  equally  vital  but  less  dramatic  problem  of 
diet.  The  day  has  now  arrived  when  the  in- 
dividual's food  needs  can  be  accurately  estimated, 
and  diet  directions  of  almost  mathematical  exact- 
ness be  given.  For  some  generations  empirical 
efforts  have  been  made  to  influence  disease 
through  diet,  but  even  yet  the  great  underlying 
principle  of  the  relation  of  food  to  work  is 
practically  unconsidered  by  either  physicians  or 
laity.  The  fireman  recognises  that  the  best  boiler 
steel  will  not  withstand  unwise  firing;  but  to-day 
ministers,  jurors,  professors  of  philosophy  and 
science,  physicians,  artists,  and  even  our  wives 
and  mothers,  are  digging  their  graves  with  their 
teeth.  One  of  the  most  marked  tendencies  of 
modern  life  is  the  rapid  substitution  of  nervous 


48    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

for  muscular  work.  The  food  requirements  for 
the  day-labourer,  the  athlete,  the  trapper  and  the 
farmer  are  distinctly  different  from  those  of  the 
professional  man,  the  business  man,  the  student 
and  the  housewife,  but  how  few  recognise  this! 
The  banker  at  forty-five  is  eating  the  buckwheat 
cakes  and  sausage,  the  fried  potatoes  and  boiled 
ham,  the  mince  pies  and  quince  preserves  that 
gave  strength  to  his  farmer  father  and  to  his 
own  boyhood  activities,  and  at  forty-eight  he  is 
dead  of  Bright 's.  The  Southern  merchant  knows 
nothing  so  good  as  the  hot  bread,  yellow  with 
soda,  and  saturated  with  its  chunk  of  melted 
butter,  swimming  in  t '  black-strap  "  or  home-made 
sorghum,  his  vegetables  soggy  with  greasy  "pot- 
licker, ' '  his  steaks  cut  thin  and  fried  black  in  lard, 
buried  in  onions  and  burning  hot  with  pepper. 
Mr.  Merchant's  financial  successes  are  of  little 
use,  as  at  fifty  he  is  a  nervous  wreck,  hopelessly 
damaged  by  foods  prepared  by  his  negro  cook — 
foods  fitted  for  her  and  her  field-hand  husband. 
Active  physical  work  with  its  constant  using  of 
muscular  tissue,  its  demand  for  deep  breathing 
and  constant  throwing  off  of  poisons  through  the 
perspiration,  requires  rich  foods,  scientifically 
spoken  of  as  highly- organised  foods.  For  muscle- 
workers,  meats,  fats  and  richer  sweets  are  prac- 
tically essential — certainly  rarely  harmful;  but 
for  the  nervous  worker — and  such  are  practically 
all  our  women,  whose  daily  use  of  muscular  force 
does  not  equal  that  of  an  active  two-year-old 
child — foods  of  this  nature  are  dangerous,  and 
usually  damaging. 


EATING  ERRORS  49 

Some  individuals  inherit  exceptionally  strong 
digestive  systems.  They  eat  heartily  and  appar- 
ently are  never  hurt  by  any  excesses  at  the  table 
— full-blooded,  robust,  usually  good-natured, 
happy  souls.  The  large  surplus  of  food  taken  in 
but  not  used  in  active  effort  is  cared  for  by  re- 
markably competent  organs  of  elimination.  The 
liver,  kidneys,  skin  and  the  muscles  also  carry  the 
burden  of  garbage  incineration  so  perfectly  as  to 
keep  the  system  free  from  damaging  accumula- 
tions. Such  men  and  women  are  becoming  less 
common.  Their  children  do  not  usually  inherit 
equal  digestive  strength.  Unquestionably,  there 
are  humans  who  can  eat  recklessly  and  at  will 
without  apparent  damage,  but  many  of  them  go 
off  suddenly  at  about  sixty  with  a  stroke.  The 
doctor  knows  that  something  burst  in  the  brain. 

Some  boilers  go  the  same  way.  In  others  food 
excesses  pile  up  rapidly  in  the  form  of  fat.  It 
is  surprising  what  a  small  amount  of  nutrition 
will  furnish  them  all  the  necessary  energy  for 
their  sedentary  lives  and  still  show  a  surplus  in 
the  form  of  many,  many  undesired  pounds.  One 
of  the  fortunate  individuals  is  he  whose  stomach 
rebels  and  continues  to  rebel  at  its  misuse  and 
abuse.  Its  owner  fairly  curses  it  for  its  protest. 
He  blames  it  morning,  noon  and  night  for  its 
faithful  efforts  to  tell  him  that  he  has  been  seduced 
by  his  palate.  It  is  a  bit  difficult,  however,  to 
impress  the  average  dyspeptic  with  a  due  sense 
of  gratitude  to  his  protesting  stomach.  If  he  but 
knew,  he  is  fortunate.  He  is  being  warned  daily 
— and  chronic  stomach  indigestion  is  not  fatal. 


50    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

Too  often  this  organ  meekly  does  its  part,  grind- 
ing away  like  some  insensate  machine,  and  pass- 
ing on  to  the  intestines  material  for  which  the 
body  has  absolutely  no  need.  Many  men  and 
women,  generally  intelligent,  who  have  suffered 
for  years  from  unrecognised  stomach  indigestion, 
will  speak  with  pride  of  their  ability  to  eat  any- 
thing. "I  have  the  digestion  of  an  ostrich;  noth- 
ing ever  hurts  me,"  they  will  say  when  fairly 
reeking  with  the  poisons  of  food  decomposition  in 
the  intestinal  tract.  Now  and  then,  in  the  more 
sensitive  make-up,  chronic  loss  of  appetite,  even 
aversion  to  food,  is  an  indication  of  the  great 
damage  which  has  already  been  done  by  errors 
in  eating. 

A  more  or  less  crude  understanding  of  the  con- 
dition of  chronic  self -poisoning,  technically  termed 
autointoxication,  has  entered  the  minds  of  most 
magazine  readers.  Hazy,  and  often  distorted  and 
inaccurate,  the  fears  bred  by  this  knowledge  may 
be  as  harmful  as  the  condition  itself.  The  simple 
truth  should  be  brought  forcibly  and  clearly  to 
all  who  would  be  well,  that  perfect  health  cannot 
be  maintained  without  an  intelligent  regulation 
of  the  quality  and  amount  of  food  and  the  nature 
and  amount  of  exercise.  When  this  balance  is 
broken,  the  door  is  open  for  many  of  the  ills  to 
which  flesh  is  heir — ills  usually  quite  remote  from 
any  intimate  connection  with  stomach,  liver,  pan- 
creas or  intestines.  A  number  of  the  most 
chronic,  distressing  and  disfiguring  skin  diseases 
are  primarily  the  result  of  autointoxication,  and 
the  specialist  has  no  hope  of  treating  them 


EATING  ERRORS  51 

successfully  save  through  a  proper  regulation  of 
diet  and  exercise.  Many  sufferers  from  catarrhal 
conditions  of  the  nose,  throat  and  other  mucous 
surfaces  are  paying  a  penalty  for  unwise  food 
indulgence.  The  irritating  poisons  within  the 
system  have  produced  irritating  secretions — the 
basis  of  these  catarrhal  inflammations.  The  army 
of  the  thin  and  bloodless,  or  sufferers  from 
anaemia  and  malnutrition,  are  underfed  through 
overeating.  Excess  of  foods  and  wrong  foods 
ferment  or  putrefy,  and  instead  of  wholesome, 
vitality  and  blood-producing  elements  being  ab- 
sorbed, daily  doses  of  blood  and  tissue  poison  are 
taken  up.  1 1  Biliousness "  rightfully  merits  the 
gentle  appellation  of  "hoggishness"  far  too  often. 
The  work  of  the  liver  is  to  further  the  process  of 
digestion,  to  take  from  the  food-material  which 
has  undergone  stomach  and  intestinal  digestion, 
elements  which  would  be  damaging  to  the  system 
if  allowed  to  circulate  in  the  blood,  and  to  convert 
these  poisonous  substances  into  bile,  which  is  re- 
turned to  the  intestinal  tract,  a  definite  aid  to 
normal  digestion.  In  biliousness  the  liver  has 
been  overworked  by  the  demands  put  upon  it. 
It  has  failed  to  successfully  convert  all  this  toxic 
material  into  bile,  and  the  patient  is  miserable 
and  temporarily  ill  because  he  is  poisoned  by  his 
own  poisons,  because  he  has  overpowered  the 
guard  at  the  gate. 

Again,  autointoxication  produces  premature  old 
age,  which  is  manifested  by  an  early  hardening  of 
the  arteries,  frequently  resulting  in  apoplexy, 
with  death  or  paralysis.  The  large  percentage  of 


52    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

Bright 's  disease  develops  from  damage  to  the 
kidneys  through  the  constant  irritation  of  the 
toxins  which  are  but  the  logical  result  of  food 
excess.  When  skin,  liver  arteries  and  kidneys 
suffer  toxic  damage,  what  is  to  be  expected  of  the 
more  vulnerable  nervous  system!  The  headaches 
and  backaches,  and  not  infrequently  the  wearing, 
nagging  foot  pains  usually  attributed  to  weakened 
arches,  are  but  the  appeals  of  nerves  capable  of 
evincing  pain,  protesting  that  their  sensitive  end- 
ings are  being  bathed  in  fluids  unfit  for  health, 
announcing,  with  the  emphasis  of  acute  physical 
discomfort,  that  there  is  a  secret  enemy  in  the 
household.  Much  physical  torture  and  intensity 
of  suffering,  criminally  relieved  by  the  deadening 
smother  of  morphin  or  other  powerful  drugs,  are 
but  agonised  appeals  of  chronically  irritated  sen- 
sory nerves  for  less  damaging  food  to  corrode, 
or  more  oxygen  to  burn  up  these  vicious  poisons. 
And  this  is  but  a  partial  list  of  the  suffering 
through  eating  errors. 

The  basis  of  all  physical  life  is  a  substance 
called  protoplasm,  not  unlike  the  white  of  egg. 
The  chief  part  of  the  cells  of  the  body,  hence  the 
bulk  of  the  body  itself,  is  composed  of  this  sub- 
stance. It  is  in  the  substance  of  the  protoplasm 
that  all  physical  and  most  chemical  activities  take 
place.  The  tears  are  formed  by  the  protoplasm 
of  certain  special  cells ;  the  tireless  beating  of  the 
heart  is  possible  because  of  the  living  protoplasm 
in  a  different  kind  of  cell.  Thought  and  will  and 
feeling  are  reactions  which  take  place  in  the  proto- 
plasm of  highly  specialised  nerve  cells.  Chemi- 


EATING  ERRORS  53 

cally  it  has  been  found  that  a  slight  degree  of 
alkalinity  is  essential  to  the  normal  life  of  this 
primary  and  vital  tissue  substance.  A  very- 
slight  change  in  the  chemical  reaction  of  the  fluids 
of  the  body  results  in  a  disturbance  of  the  well- 
being  of  the  protoplasm.  It  is  imperative  that 
blood,  lymph  and  other  fluids  which  go  to  nourish 
and  protect  the  body  be  always  moderately  alka- 
line in  reaction.  If  the  body  fluids  or  tissues 
become  even  slightly  acid,  death  of  part,  or  death 
of  body  quickly  results ;  and  so,  chemically  speak- 
ing, health  is  possible  only  when  the  balance 
between  the  acids,  and  the  bases,  as  alkaline  sub- 
stances are  called,  is  delicately  and  accurately 
maintained.  Excess  of  alkali  and  dominance  of 
acidity  are  alike  fatal.  The  latter  condition  is 
called  acidosis,  and  the  tendency  of  many  food 
excesses  is  to  decrease  the  alkalinity  of  the  tissues 
and  so  to  break  that  vital  chemical  balance  which 
is  necessary  for  health  and  even  for  life. 

Every  mouthful  of  food  taken  is  a  chemical 
influence.  Some  foods  are  base-  or  alkaline- 
forming;  others,  acid-forming.  Meat  is  the  most 
generally  used  of  the  proteid  foods  by  our  race. 
All  meats  are  acid-producing.  Of  the  carbohy- 
drates, sweets  in  excess  of  the  actual  need  of  the 
system,  and  of  hydrocarbons,  overindulgence  in 
fats  or  oils  as  well,  result  in  overacidity.  While 
the  fatal  condition  of  acidosis  is  rarely  met,  a 
modified  form  called  subacidosis,  in  which  there  is 
a  marked  decrease  in  the  alkaline  reserve  and 
a  lessened  ability  of  the  tissues  to  resist  the  dam- 
aging influence  of  acids,  is  a  condition  found  in 


54    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

the  average  sedentary  individual.  Subacidosis  is 
a  logical,  chemical  basis  for  nervousness,  whether 
manifested  in  the  form  of  the  torturing  neural- 
gias and  sensory  pains  referred  to,  or  in  the 
excessive  nervous  irritability  which  seems  to 
make  physical  restlessness  imperative  and  to  rob 
the  sufferer  of  muscular  control,  or  in  the  form 
of  the  chronic  weariness  of  nervous  exhaustion. 
Whatever  its  manifestations,  the  physical  damage 
of  nervousness  is  practically  always  due  to  a  self- 
intoxication  in  which  the  vital  alkalinity  of  the 
sensitive  protoplasm  forming  the  nervous  tissue 
has  been  reduced.  This  damage,  to  repeat  a  truth 
which  should  be  shouted  from  the  house-tops,  may 
be  avoided  only  by  maintaining  that  essential 
chemical  equilibrium  possible  through  a  correct 
balance  of  food  and  exercise,  of  fuel  and  draft  in 
the  furnace.  Let  us  realise  that  it  is  not  the  meat 
we  eat  or  do  not  eat,  it  is  not  the  excess  of  sweets, 
bonbons,  preserves  or  syrups,  it  is  not  the  grease 
kneaded  into  our  biscuit  or  fried  into  our  steaks 
that  maims,  pains,  weakens  and  finally  kills,  but 
it  is  the  years  of  lack  of  balance  between  food 
and  exercise,  between  fuel  and  fire ;  the  difference 
between  the  clean,  alkaline  ash  of  complete  oxi- 
dation and  the  clinkers  and  soot  and  acid  smudge 
of  the  choked  furnace  with  defective  draft. 

The  inorganic  substances  taken  with  our  food 
affect  our  well-being  through  the  laws  of  physics, 
as  well  as  through  the  laws  of  chemistry.  The 
circulating  fluids  of  the  body  must  not  only  main- 
tain a  specific  chemical  reaction,  but  a  definite 
density.  Water,  while  possessing  no  food  value, 


EATING  ERKORS  55 

is  vitally  essential  to  feeding,  as  no  food  which  is 
not  soluble  can  be  used  by  the  cells ;  and  numbers 
of  the  most  damaging  poisons  to  the  system  are 
removed  in  the  excretions,  after  being  dissolved  in 
water.  Water  is  the  indispensable  vehicle  for 
carrying  food  to  the  tissues,  and  for  removing 
tissue  waste.  Protoplasm  is  quickly  disorganised 
by  pure  water.  A  little  more  than  one-half  of  one 
per  cent,  of  ordinary  salt,  however,  added  to 
water  makes  a  solution  in  which  protoplasm 
thrives.  Over  seventy  per  cent,  of  the  body 
weight  is  water — water  containing  six-tenths  of 
one  per  cent,  of  salt.  Silver  and  even  gold  are 
eagerly  exchanged,  weight  for  weight,  for  salt, 
in  communities  remote  from  adequate  supply ;  for 
without  salt  fatal  weaknesses  soon  supervene. 
On  the  other  hand,  excess  of  salt  in  food,  or  lack 
of  water  with  food,  increases  the  density  of  the 
fluids  of  the  body,  and  interferes  with  many  of 
the  finer  processes  of  nutrition.  Consequently 
many  suffer  nervously,  because  through  high 
seasoning  their  taste  has  become  perverted,  and 
they  are  constantly  overusing  salt.  This  damage 
would  be  greatly  lessened  if  quantities  of  water 
were  also  taken,  but  underdrinking  is  a  common 
fault  of  the  nervous,  particularly  among  women. 
The  guest  is  rather  exceptional  with  intuition 
so  fine  as  to  compliment  the  preparation  of  the 
food  by  accepting  his  host's  standards  of  seasoning 
as  his  own.  It  is  usually  a  shower  of  salt  and  a 
cloud  of  pepper  on  every  dish,  even  before  it  has 
been  tasted.  The  habit  of  overseasoning  has  be- 
come so  ingrained  in  many  that  all  delicacy  of 


56    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

taste  and  sensitiveness  of  palate  have  long  since 
disappeared.  The  injury  to  stomach  and  kidneys 
is  probably  more  practically  harmful  than  the 
hurt  to  one's  manners. 

Tea  and  coffee  in  moderation  can  be  cared  for 
without  harming  the  system  of  the  average  healthy 
person.  They  both  contain  a  chemical  substance 
— caffein — which  in  excess  is  a  poison  damaging 
alike  to  heart  and  nerves.  Their  effect  in  large 
quantities,  like  that  of  alcohol  and  tobacco,  is  to 
produce  an  artificial  sense  of  adequacy,  of  ability, 
of  strength ;  to  temporarily  eradicate  the  sense  of 
fatigue.  And  the  inadequate,  the  ones  with  the 
least  reserve,  in  their  impatient  or  ignorant  seek- 
ing for  that  which  will  bring  quick  comfort,  are 
usually  the  tea  and  coffee  topers,  enslaved  by 
their  so-called  "temperance  cups." 

Food  and  Morals. — The  day  has  now  come 
when  each  individual  can  have  the  benefit  of 
accurate  scientific  advice  as  to  food  restrictions. 
The  rapid  increase  in  the  damage  from  errors  in 
eating,  with  the  perfecting  of  dietary  knowledge, 
is  hastening  the  day  when  an  enlarging  number 
of  the  nervous,  particularly,  will  seek  and  follow 
saving  counsel.  Were  the  damage  limited  to  the 
physical  effects,  the  evils  of  eating  should  be 
sufficiently  serious  to  arouse  the  thoughtful 
to  protective  action;  but  just  as  alcohol  sends  its 
curse  echoing  through  the  generations,  so  food 
poisoning  is  adding  its  burden,  a  burden  of  mental 
and  moral  inferiority,  to  our  race. 

One  of  the  earliest  advances  in  necessary  re- 
formation will  be  made  in  the  kitchen.  The  good 


EATING  ERRORS  57 

housewife  may  select  the  food  for  her  flock  with 
all  the  wisdom  of  the  physician  prescribing  for 
a  critically  ill  patient,  and  have  her  plans  for 
the  strength  and  safety  of  her  family  wrecked  by 
the  cook.  The  abominations  perpetrated  under 
the  name  of  cooking  are  legion.  Overcooking  will 
convert  nutritious  meats  into  modified  raw-hide. 
Eggs  emerge  from  some  kitchens  about  as  digest- 
ible as  chamois-skin.  Breads  and  pastries  are 
served  in  a  consistency  differing  little  from  putty. 
The  delicacy  of  flavour  and  the  nutrition  is  cooked 
out  of  soups,  and  the  most  delicate  foods  come 
to  the  table  saturated  with  greases  which  have 
been  rendered  nutritionally  impossible  through 
overheating  and  the  liberation  of  their  fatty  acids. 
Fruits  and  desserts  are  sticky  with  sugar;  salt, 
pepper  and  other  condiments  are  used  in  excesses 
which  cause  actual  pain  to  the  normal  palate. 
Food  so  prepared  is  practically  incapable  of  diges- 
tion by  the  normal  stomach,  until  it  is  overstimu- 
lated  by  pepper  or  whipped  up  with  alcohol. 

Thousands  of  periodic  drunkards  begin  a  spree, 
unconsciously  seeking  in  alcohol  a  temporary  ap- 
pease from  the  nervous  harassings  growing  out 
of  their  inability  to  assimilate  the  unconscious 
criminality  of  the  kitchen.  The  average  wife  of 
such  an  unfortunate  would  resent  with  indignation 
the  charge  that  she  was  largely  responsible  for 
her  husband's  humiliating  drunkenness.  Not 
only  does  ignorant  cooking  frequently  produce 
the  craving  for  alcohol,  the  demand  for  the  sooth- 
ing, either  of  nicotine  or  drugs,  or  the  ever-return- 
ing call  for  the  "  pick-me-up "  of  strong  tea  or 


58         THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

coffee,  but  it  is  to-day,  and  has  been  through  gen- 
erations, actively  creating  immorality.  The  re- 
lation between  the  immoral,  and  nervous  insta- 
bility, will  always  be  a  close  one.  The  old 
drunkard  philosophised  well  when  he  complained, 
"The  neighbours  always  talk  of  my  drinking,  but 
they  never  speak  of  my  drought. "  He  certainly 
knew  the  meaning  of  that  depression,  that  crav- 
ing, that  insistent  demand  which  autointoxication 
lays  upon  the  nervously  unstable. 


CHAPTER  VI 
THE  PENALTY  OF  INACTIVITY 

Man  Created  for  Activity. — The  problem  of 
physical  exercise  did  not  concern  primitive  man. 
For  him  inactivity  meant  a  prompt  departure  for 
the  land  of  the  unknown.  Upon  his  strength,  his 
agility,  his  speed,  hung  the  thread  of  his  precar- 
ious life.  To  him  Nature  said,  "Work  or  starve, 
fight  or  die,  run  or  be  eaten."  Archeologists  are 
daily  uncovering  evidences  of  the  almost  unbeliev- 
able work  of  primitive  man's  hands;  but  the 
testimony  of  Egypt's  pyramids  and  the  stone 
cities  of  Peru  discloses  but  a  minute  portion  of  his 
productive  handiwork.  "Fight  or  be  killed, " — 
and  with  bare  hands  he  wrestled  with  the  beasts 
of  the  wilds;  and  with  every  man's  hand  at  his 
throat  it  was  for  him  to  possess  powerful,  hardy 
muscles,  or  succumb.  Ever  hunted  by  biped, 
quadruped  and  crawling  thing,  with  little  pro- 
tection in  his  cave  home  or  stone  shack,  the  future 
of  many  generations  rested  in  his  speed  and  en- 
durance. The  question  of  muscular  exercise  for 
our  remote  forefathers  was  well  seen  to  by  Mother 
Nature.  Work,  work,  work  has  been  the  insis- 
tently reverberating  cry  of  human  necessity  since 
things  went  wrong  in  Eden;  and  what  a  mass  of 
it  there  has  been  and  still  is  for  man  to  do !  In 

59 


60         THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

how  magnificent  a  home  of  opportunities  was  he 
placed,  and  how  superbly  was  he  equipped  in  body 
and  mind  with  capacities  which  have  developed 
ability  and  energy  rivalling  that  of  his  own  ancient 
gods! 

Our  brawny  ancestors  endowed  their  children 
with  physiques  built  largely  of  purposeful  muscle. 
When  we  examine  the  body,  we  find  it  half  muscle, 
unless  overweighted  with  fat  or  shrunken  and 
shrivelled  by  disuse  or  misuse — half  muscle,  and 
most  of  this  active  tissue  is  under  the  direct  com- 
mand of  man's  will.  The  voluntary  muscles, 
when  normal,  are  eager  to  do  his  bidding,  and  to 
perform  for  him  an  ever-increasing  variety  of  pro- 
ductive and  pleasurable  movements.  A  Great 
"Wisdom,  however,  was  evidently  concerned  about 
man's  tenure  of  earthly  existence,  and  so  placed 
certain  vital  processes  requiring  muscular  move- 
ment in  charge  of  the  brain,  yet  independent  of 
the  conscious  action  of  will.  The  ceaseless 
activities  of  the  heart,  the  life-long  throb  of  the 
blood-carrying  vessels,  much  of  the  ebb  and  flow 
of  breathing  and  of  the  necessary  transfer  of 
food  from  one  department  of  digestion  to  another 
— these  and  other  activities  essential  to  human  life 
take  place  through  the  action  of  the  so-called  in- 
voluntary muscles,  subject  to  no  direct  control 
by  the  will. 

But  essential  as  muscular  movement  is  to  the 
carrying  out  of  man's  multiform  activities,  this 
remarkable  tissue  has  other  scarcely  less  import- 
ant uses — uses  unthought  by  the  average  mind. 


THE  PENALTY  OF  INACTIVITY  61 

Food  and  oxygen  are  brought  through  the  blood 
to  the  muscles,  where  they  unite,  producing  heat 
and  power.  The  demand  of  the  muscles  is  the 
legitimate  call  for  a  large  part  of  the  food  actually 
needed  by  the  human  body,  and  muscle  activity 
instantly  and  persistently  demands  an  increased 
intake  of  oxygen.  The  muscle  tissue  is  man's 
great  consumer  of  food  and  air,  which  within  the 
muscle  cells  are  transformed  into  human  energy. 
Muscle  is  not  only  the  furnace  ceaselessly  turn- 
ing food  and  air  into  warmth  and  power  and 
reserve  strength,  but  it  is  the  body's  incinerator, 
burning  into  harmless  ash  the  nerve-nagging 
toxins  which  so  quickly  form  through  indulgence 
and  inactivity.  Much  that  would  be  noxious  to 
brain,  nerves  and  other  delicate  tissues  of  the 
body,  is  oxidized  into  harmlessness  within  the  cells 
of  healthy  muscle  tissue.  From  the  standpoint 
of  general  health,  of  resistance  to  infection,  of 
that  rare  chronic  sense  of  strength  and  well-being, 
of  the  development  of  an  increasing  reserve  of 
power,  muscles  properly  fed  and  energetically 
used  constitute  the  vitality-giving  tissues  of  the 
body.  Use  is  good  for  muscles.  Many  months 
before  birth  the  tiny  heart  begins  to  pulsate,  and 
seventy-five  times  a  minute  throughout  life,  its 
daily  contractions  representing  the  lifting  force 
of  a  powerful  engine,  it  works  on  and  on,  often 
continuing  its  faithful  pulsating  hours  or  days 
after  other  vital  forces  have  ceased.  The  heart 
is  but  a  hollow  muscle,  but  all  of  man's  victories 
rest  in  the  tireless  persistence  of  its  action. 


62         THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

The  relation  of  the  will  to  the  strength  and  de- 
velopment of  the  voluntary  muscles  is  intimate. 
They  remain  soft,  inactive,  sluggish,  an  increas- 
ing menace  to  his  well-being,  till  commanded  to 
act,  to  exert,  to  grow  strong  by  work.  The  master 
man  has  attained  much  of  his  health,  his  inde- 
pendence of  fatigue,  his  superiority  to  disease, 
his  fearlessness  in  action,  his  resoluteness  in 
decision,  his  calm  confidence  of  conscious  reserve, 
through  the  years  of  interaction  of  will,  muscle 
and  work.  Man  was  created  for  activity — for  a 
thousand,  yes,  for  many  thousand  activities ;  and 
only  in  action,  and  rarely  except  in  productive 
action,  does  he  find  the  satisfaction  which  comes 
through  the  conscious  fulfilment  of  purpose,  and 
that  gratified  sense  of  completeness  gained 
through  accomplishment.  Brain,  will,  muscle 
only  attain  their  highest  development  and  great- 
est power  through  use — earnest,  active,  intensive 
use. 

In  due  time  our  ancient  forefathers  discovered 
easier  ways  of  disposing  of  their  enemies  than 
by  cracking  their  skulls  with  cobble-stones  at 
short  range;  and  since  that  eventful  day  man's 
wits  have  never  ceased  devising  new  means  of 
tickling  Nature  into  smiling  productiveness,  of 
killing  his  neighbour  at  longer  and  longer  dis- 
tances, until  to-day,  in  the  trenches  of  war,  huge 
cylinders  of  steel  vomit  forth  tons  of  explosives 
to  destroy  his  unseen  foe  at  the  edge  of  the  hori- 
zon. By  one  stab  at  the  vitals  of  his  sea-going 
palace  a  torpedo  sends  a  thousand  unconscious 
lives  gurgling  to  death.  Steam  and  electricity 


THE  PENALTY  OF  INACTIVITY  63 

are  whirling  his  engines  of  peace  and  war  through 
space,  across  the  continents  and  skimming  the 
surface  of  the  deep  with  the  speed  of  the  tornado. 
It  seems  that  man's  wit  has  made  his  muscle  of 
little  importance.  When  ages  ago,  with  a  thong 
about  its  lower  jaw  he  subdued  the  beast  of  the 
field,  the  pride  of  mastery  and  possession  began 
its  devitalising  work  of  rendering  him  brain- 
proud.  Since  that  day  ever-increasing  numbers 
have  returned  from  the  blessings  of  activity  to 
the  pride  of  indolence,  and  each  century  of  brain- 
mastery  has  lessened  the  necessity  for  muscle  use 
and  increased  the  aristocracy  of  idleness;  and 
humankind,  still  in  its  youth,  still  facing  its  hun- 
dreds of  centuries  of  maturity,  is  growing  tired. 
Tired  men,  tired  women,  tired  children  are  about 
us.  Tired  faces  greet  us  in  the  morning;  tired 
voices  complain  through  the  work  hours;  tired 
and  mirthless  laughter  is  heard  at  the  play.  The 
penalty  of  generations  of  physical  neglect  is  being 
exacted.  Man  is  wearied,  fatigued,  exhausted, 
because  he  has  not  worked. 

Fatigue  Versus  Exhaustion. — Within  a  short 
generation  only  have  Science  and  educators  raised 
the  voice  of  authority  against  the  certain  evils 
of  physical  inactivity.  The  growing  influence  of 
wise  counsel  has  multiplied  gymnasiums  in  col- 
lege, city  and  town,  is  popularising  golf,  tennis 
and  other  sports ;  while  in  more  and  more  homes 
daily  time  is  devoted  to  constructive  physical 
activity.  Herein  exists  a  prediction  that  our 
grandchildren  may  find  rest.  There  is  much 
ignorance  connected  with  our  generation's  weari- 


64    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

ness.  Daily  fatigue  of  muscle  is  the  natural  basis 
for  appetite,  sleep  and  strength.  Daily  fatigue4 
is  not  only  harmless,  but  so  essential  as  to  be 
moral.  Food  unearned  through  body  activity  is 
a  drug  to  the  system;  sleep  which  does  not  come 
as  a  reward  of  tasks  earnestly  done  is  often  but 
an  enervating  period  of  insensibility;  while  no 
man  or  woman  can  know  the  keen  joy  of  exuberant 
strength  who  has  not  felt  the  heavy,  drowsing 
hand  of  fatigue.  Normal  fatigue  is  as  harmless 
as  the  quiet  of  night,  and  the  sober  drapings  of 
worthy  weariness  but  hide  the  growing  form  of 
reserve  of  power.  Energy  surplus  develops 
through  those  daily  activities  which  mean  acute, 
even  sheer,  physical  fatigue.  Thousands  who 
complain  of  being  chronically  tired  are  but 
describing  weakness.  Their  weariness  is  a  weak- 
ness which  has  never  been  replaced  by  that 
strength  which  comes  to  many  latter-day  men  and 
women  only  through  consistent,  persistent  mus- 
cular doing.  Fortunate  is  the  intelligent  man 
whose  will  commands  that  his  fatigue  be  no  excuse 
for  inactivity.  Normal  muscular  fatigue  of  the 
healthy  body  should  be  soon  followed  by  a  sense 
of  well-being  and  eager  buoyancy,  which  to 
possess  is  to  half  master  the  ills  of  life. 

Most  of  the  "  tired  "  and  "  tired-out "  are  either 
chronic  loafers  of  life  or  the  nervously-exhausted 
sons  and  daughters  of  toxic  or  emotional  excess; 
but  " weariness "  and  "fatigue"  are  to-day  terms 
much  too  mild  to  express  their  feelings. 
"Exhaustion" — "utter  and  complete  exhaustion" 
follows  the  trip  to  town  shopping;  exhaustion  is 


THE  PENALTY  OF  INACTIVITY  65 

the  " morning  after"  result  of  the  evening's 
entertainment;  is  the  mistress '  aftermath  of  a 
wordy  misunderstanding  with  her  servant;  it 
follows  as  a  shadow  modern  under-developed  lives 
through  useful  and  useless  activities.  Muscular 
"  exhaustion, "  even  when  quite  complete,  is  rare, 
and  seldom  serious  in  its  effects.  Unaccompanied 
with  mental  or  emotional  disturbance,  and  in  the 
absence  of  severe  organic  disease,  recovery 
quickly  follows  the  temporary  incapacity  of  even 
extreme  physical  effort. 

The  offices  of  the  neurologists  are  crowded  with 
those  who  have  come  to  seek  relief  for  their  nerves 
— relief  chiefly  for  the  damage  done  by  "over- 
work. ' '  Among  a  hundred  one  may  be  found  who 
has  gone  through  years  of  pent-up  drudgery, 
generously  self-sacrificing,  patiently  striving  to 
make  ends  meet,  probably  the  while  suffering 
from  defective  food  oxidation.  Most  of  the  others 
are  inherently  weak  because  they  have  never 
developed  power,  or  are  poisoning  their  powers 
of  endurance  by  excesses  at  the  table  or  at  the 
bar ;  or  belong  to  that  larger  group  daily  scatter- 
ing their  strength  broadcast  by  the  friction  of 
worry,  or  the  devitalisation  of  fear,  or  the  de- 
moralisation of  wrong-doing.  Overwork,  when 
work  is  rightly  and  wisely  done,  is  truly  a  rare 
cause  for  neurasthenia,  but  nervous  exhaustion  is 
common;  it  is  rife  in  our  land.  The  normal 
nervous  system  may  resist  the  damage  of  the 
accumulated  poisons  of  inactivity  or  the  energy- 
leakages  of  fear  and  worry  through  many  years. 
Nervous  exhaustion  in  the  average  person,  even 


66          THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

in  the  face  of  misuse,  abuse  or  disuse,  comes 
slowly;  it  is  recovered  from  slowly.  Normal 
muscular  fatigue  may  be  produced  in  a  few  min- 
utes or  hours,  and  disappears  with  a  short  period 
of  rest.  The  nervous  system  resists  its  surrender 
through  the  years,  ofttimes  until  abuses  have 
become  habits — habits  so  insistent  and  clinging 
that  in  re-education  alone  may  the  neurotic  find 
restoration. 

The  Penalty  of  Inactivity. — We  have  seen  that 
muscle  in  the  average  man  is  half  his  body 
weight,  a  living  tissue  intended  for  active,  ener- 
getic use — fifty  to  a  hundred  pounds  of  strength, 
vitality  and  joy-producing  tissue  if  sanely  cared 
for.  But  these  same  muscles  hang  to  many 
modern  bones  sluggish,  inert,  weakness-producing 
masses  of  near-decomposition.  Unused  muscle 
tissue,  like  the  unstirred  water  of  the  swamp, 
breeds  within  itself  vitiating  poisons.  This  same 
poison-infected  swamp-water,  allowed  to  dash 
down  the  mountain  side,  is  soon  lashed  and 
oxidized  into  refreshing  purity — even  so  may  toxic 
muscles  be  purified  by  that  use  which  daily  wrings 
every  drop  of  fluid  from  their  structure,  leaving 
them  eager  for  constructive  food  and  oxygen. 
The  toxins  of  inactivity  are  akin  to  the  toxins  of 
food-indulgence,  and  these  two  poison  groups  ac- 
count for  much  that  makes  man  physically  and 
nervously  miserable,  and  go  far  to  rob  him  of 
comfort  and  ambition,  of  ease  of  mind  and  peace 
of  soul.  Within  these  pounds  of  flesh  abides  a 
dynamo  which,  wisely  operated,  converts  food  into 
strength,  yokes  the  carbon  and  oxygen  into  ever- 


THE  PENALTY  OF  INACTIVITY  67 

returning  power,  and  destroys  to  a  vestige  many 
lurking  dangers.  These  pounds  of  tissue  may  be 
made  man's  open  friends;  in  all  too  many  bodies 
to-day  they  are  his  secret  enemies. 

Physical  health  should  be  but  a  simple  matter. 
With  the  daily  balancing  of  food  and  exercise  all 
is  well,  and  all  should  stay  well  through  a  long 
and  comfortable  span  of  useful  years.  But 
underused  bodies  and  overused  brains  tell  the 
story  of  a  world  of  nervous  suffering,  tell  the 
story  of  many  incapacitating  and  pain-producing 
organic  diseases,  and  should  be  the  epitaph  on 
many  tombstones  of  those  who  die  at  forty-five 
and  fifty.  Ignorance,  indolence,  cheap  pride, 
sentimentalism,  excess  of  plenty,  love  of  ease  and 
the  mastery  of  pleasure  stand  between  man  and 
the  simple  law  of  physical  health,  which  com- 
mands that  his  muscles  earn  what  he  eats.  The 
food  necessary  for  nervous  use  is  of  the  simplest 
kind.  Such  food  in  small  amounts  will  supply 
all  the  requirements  of  brain,  heart,  lungs  and 
glands.  Active  muscular  work,  however,  calls 
for  food  of  increased  quality  and  quantity.  He 
who  keeps  his  great  muscle  bulk  active  and  whole- 
some may  humour  his  palate  with  reasonable  im- 
punity. 

Though  well-muscled  individuals  do  go  to  pieces 
nervously  through  other  causes  than  defective 
food  oxidation,  the  majority  of  the  nervous  are 
muscularly  defective.  Scrawny  muscles  and  flat 
chests  are  common  with  the  nervous,  and  are 
almost  constantly  found  in  those  who  suffer  from 
the  " blues."  A  poorly  developed  chest  means 


68    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

deficiency  of  oxygen  and  a  consequent  excess  of 
toxin.  Men  and  women  whose  flabby  muscles 
have  received  but  a  small  part  of  their  possible 
development  recruit  the  ranks  of  the  nervous. 
Many  reach  maturity,  full-grown  and  practically 
muscleless,  unconscious  caricatures  of  the  human 
physique.  Bodies  which  have  been  pampered 
through  the  first  twenty  years  of  life,  protected 
alike  from  heat  and  cold,  work  and  developing 
play,  nursed  and  coddled,  too  often  contain  a 
nervous  system  tense  and  distraught,  capable  of 
little  but  expressions  of  depression,  sensitiveness 
to  discomfort  and  awareness  of  the  pains  of  exist- 
ence. Many  a  girl  is  robbed  in  her  early  teens  of 
much  of  her  chance  for  lasting  health  and  saving 
robustness  through  the  carpings  of  Mrs.  Grundy. 
Her  skirts,  the  enemy  of  freedom  of  movement 
and  action,  are  lengthened,  and  warnings  from 
mother  and  maiden  aunts  doom  her  to  restrictions 
of  action  and  primness  of  conduct  which  early 
discount  the  promise  of  abundant  health.  To  hide 
a  few  inches  of  stocking  she  becomes  a  slave  of 
propriety,  perchance  a  victim  of  muscular  non- 
development.  Women  to-day  are  rare  whose 
muscles  have  come  into  their  fulness.  How  few 
are  muscularly  equipped  to  safely  meet  the  bur- 
dens of  maternity,  or  even  the  wear  and  tear  of 
a  life  of  self-support! 

Some  feminine  men  and  the  majority  of  modern 
women  fail  to  prepare  themselves  for  a  life  of 
merely  average  health  through  hardy  muscles. 
Most  men,  through  the  out-door  life  and  active 
sports,  the  rough-and-ready  games  and  the  give- 


THE  PENALTY  OF  INACTIVITY  69 

and-take,  fight-or-get-licked  habits  of  boys,  reach 
their  majority  with  a  fairly  useful  set  of  muscles. 
But  the  play  habit,  poorly  developed  in  girls,  is 
rapidly  lost  in  men  after  twenty;  and  with  an 
increasing  number  of  successful  men  practically 
all  work  of  hands  or  body  is  discontinued  by 
middle  age,  and  physically,  the  remaining  days 
are  spent  in  the  midst  of  the  violence  and  excite- 
ment of  the  " tabby-cat  life."  By  forty  the 
average  woman  is  exercising  with  little  but  her 
tongue,  and  the  average  man  with  little  but  his 
teeth.  There  were  gods  in  olden  days  who  sat 
on  old  Olympus.  To-day  there  are  the  voices  of 
Science.  Even  as  Jove  struck  the  jeerer  of  his 
powers  with  sudden  death,  so  to-day  the  presump- 
tuous mortal  who,  through  decades  of  physical 
indolence  and  inactivity,  jeers  at  the  unalterable 
truths  of  Science,  jeers  at  a  fate  which  may  strike 
as  suddenly  and  relentlessly  as  did  mythic  Jove. 
Fat,  flabby  and  forty  is  written  across  many  a 
satisfied,  vapid,  characterless  face;  while  lean, 
wrinkled  and  wizened,  distorted  by  years  of 
wasted  agitation,  those  other  unhappy  faces  of 
neglected  oxidation  haunt  us  with  their  restless 
misery.  Both  types  are  suffering  from  oxygen 
hunger.  One  puffs  and  waddles  through  life, 
doughy  with  useless  fat.  The  other  fusses  and 
fumes,  irritable  and  irritating,  knowing  and  giv- 
ing no  hour  of  comfort,  chronically,  miserably, 
painfully  toxic.  Neither  has  ever  done  any  real 
breathing,  for  real  breathing  is  done  in  the 
muscles.  The  air  enters  the  lungs  and  gives  up 
its  oxygen  to  the  blood,  because  it  is  seeking  for 


70         THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

the  food  carbon  in  the  tissues,  and  the  bulk  of 
our  tissue  is  muscle.  Most  brain-workers — and 
such  are  most  of  us — ministers  and  clerks,  lawyers 
and  stenographers,  doctors  and  merchants,  artists 
and  editors,  contractors  and  watch-makers,  have 
no  necessity  for  muscle  use.  Fed  and  clothed 
and  enriched  through  their  wits,  they  steadfastly 
ignore  the  call  of  their  biceps.  Seeking  home  and 
rest  for  the  weakness  which  is  theirs  through 
non-development,  buying  pills  for  their  pains,  for 
years  they  creep  along  the  uncertain  margin 
separating  their  precarious  health  from  nervous 
wreckage. 

Whether  the  cause  of  one's  defective  homage 
to  the  rational  demand  of  his  muscular  system 
be  due  to  the  futile  pride  in  inactivity,  common 
to  cheap  aristocracy,  or  to  the  even  less  worthy 
inertia  of  indolence,  a  constant  danger  of  will 
damage  lurks  behind  habitual  muscular  inactivity. 
Flabby  wills  often  cling  to  flabby  muscles.  Many 
there  are,  idly  busy,  occupying  themselves  with 
small  things,  selfishly  small  things — playing  at 
work,  deceiving  themselves  and  perchance  some 
others  into  the  belief  that  they  are  really  useful 
and  industrious.  They  belong  to  that  strange 
class  with  great  ideas  but  small  duties — those 
whose  converse  promises  much,  whose  hands  do 
little,  whose  ideals  soar,  whose  fingers  dabble; 
or  to  that  almost  equally  satisfied  type  whose 
occupation  consists  in  preoccupation.  Whichever 
the  form  of  high  thinking  and  low  doing,  the  sav- 
ing, developing  sense  of  reality,  that  genuine 
human  relationship  with  facts  and  truth,  is 


THE  PENALTY  OF  INACTIVITY  71 

dimmed,  even  destroyed.  Serious  investigation 
into  the  nature  and  character  of  man  reveals  the 
truth  that  he  was  created  for  productive  activity. 
Nature  suggests  man's  immortality  by  frequently 
delaying  the  penalty  of  the  individual's  neglect 
of  her  laws,  but  in  the  life  of  the  individual  him- 
self, or  in  that  of  his  offspring,  her  revenge  is 
sure  and  bitter  upon  those  who  ignorantly  or 
persistently  defy  her  laws  of  activity. 


CHAPTER  VII 
EATING  FOE  EFFICIENCY 

What  to  Eat. — The  person  is  rare  who  has  not 
recognised  self-damage  from  unwise  eating.  It 
may  have  been  but  acute  indigestion  with  its 
burning  sour  stomach  and  nausea,  or  the  more 
miserable  sick  headache,  or  the  acute,  relentless 
stabs  of  abdominal  pain;  or  again,  the  physical 
heaviness  and  sluggishness,  the  mental  dulness 
and  inertia  which  proclaimed  harmful  indulgence. 
These  acute  expressions  when  accepted  as  pen- 
alties may  become  the  incentives  to  resolutions  to 
avoid  this  or  that  food  upon  which  the  suspicion 
rests.  But  the  more  insidious  effects,  the  evils 
of  chronic  food-poisoning — the  autointoxications, 
the  subacidosis,  the  anaemia,  the  malnutrition,  the 
restless,  sleepless  nights,  the  irritable,  fretful, 
impatient  days  with  the  inability  to  relax  and  to 
know  repose,  the  nerve-racking  neuralgias* — these 
and  kindred  hosts  come  to  many,  the  absolutely 
unrecognised  results  of  eating  errors.  And  each 
ill  and  pain  robs  the  sufferer  of  efficiency,  dis- 
credits the  pleasure  of  living  and  discounts  per- 
sonal usefulness.  Strength  of  muscle,  keenness 
of  intellect,  breadth  of  judgment,  beauty  of 
ideation,  tenderness  of  sympathy,  are  all  depend- 
ent for  their  proper  expression  upon  a  normally 

72 


EATING  FOR  EFFICIENCY  73 

active  nervous  system.  But  the  man  who  is  on 
edge,  oversensitive,  questioning  his  own  strength, 
poorly  administers  his  muscle,  his  intellect  and 
the  expression  of  heart,  mind  and  soul.  We  have 
already  seen  the  serious  menace  to  physical  whole- 
ness and  nervous  stability  which  abides  in  the 
defective  handling  of  food  by  the  tissues  of  the 
body.  The  principles  have  been  repeated  and 
emphasised  that  food  and  work,  carbon  and 
oxygen,  must  be  balanced;  that  herein,  roughly 
but  unequivocally  speaking,  rests  the  chemical 
basis  of  nervous  efficiency;  and  nervous  efficiency 
is  human  efficiency. 

What  to  eat?  What  vistas  of  thought  and  what 
possible  answers  this  query  suggests!  As  these 
words  are  written  for  men  and  women  living  in 
the  midst  of  twentieth  century  plenty,  men  and 
women  whose  choice  alone  can  constitute  the 
answer,  the  question  is  practically  simplified,  and 
for  them  the  answer  should  be  found  in  the  voice 
of  reason.  But  reason  is  assailed  on  the  subject 
of  food  by  many  teachers.  When  we  recall  our 
axiom  that  it  is  not  what  we  eat,  but  what  we  eat 
that  is  not  utilised  that  does  us  harm,  we  readily 
see  that  varying  individuals  with  varying  inherit- 
ances, following  divers  occupations,  may  eat  the 
rankest  extremes  of  foods  and  thrive,  and  by  their 
very  health  advertise  a  multitude  of  diets  and 
menus.  It  will  be  several  decades  before  numer- 
ous intricate  problems  of  the  chemistry  of  the 
body  are  adjusted  to  the  complex  chemistry  of 
foods,  and  not  until  that  time  will  teachers  be 
in  agreement.  The  teachings  of  this  chapter  have 


74         THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

grown  out  of  a  quarter  century  of  careful  study 
and  intimate  experiences  with  the  relation  of  food 
to  nervous  well-being,  and  while  the  suggestions 
contained  might  not  meet  with  favour  at  a  foot- 
ball training  table,  would  raise  a  storm  of  pro- 
test in  a  logging  camp,  and  be  turned  from  with 
disdain  by  the  hardy,  ravenous,  harvest  hand,  yet 
much  of  lasting  good  will  be  found  by  men  and 
women  whose  life's  usefulness  and  efficiency  is 
being  robbed  by  nervousness. 

For  too  many  years  the  nervous  sufferer  has 
not  asked  himself,  "What  shall  I  eat?"  It  has 
always  been,  "What  shall  I  take?"  So  drugs 
have  multiplied  to  lull  discordant  nerves  into  a 
night 's  repose — drugs  which  could  not  feed,  could 
not  strengthen,  could  only  stun.  Not  recognising 
the  intimate  relation  between  food  and  suffering, 
many  of  the  nervous  have  grown  less  reasonable 
and  more  impatient,  more  insistent,  more  demand- 
ing about  their  food,  the  appetite  being  the  only 
voice  at  the  feast  to  which  they  have  listened; 
and  the  appetite  is  for  most  of  us  a  creation  of 
habit,  the  product  of  youthful  training.  This 
mentor  at  our  table  is  too  frequently  but  an  igno- 
rant, uninstructed  desire,  ever  asserting,  "I  want 
what  I  want  when  I  want  it."  Let  the  stall-fed 
ox  break  into  the  field  of  green  corn,  and  the 
farmer  is  in  haste  to  drive  him  out,  to  save  him 
from  death  by  ' l  foundering, ' '  through  the  call  of 
the  "natural  appetite."  Yet  even  enlightened 
to-day  finds  us  as  a  nation  following  the  untutored 
leading  of  our  appetites,  not  often  to  sudden 
death,  but  to  undervalued  lives  and  to  curtailed 


EATING  FOE  EFFICIENCY  75 

lives.  Normal  appetite  is  a  blessing.  The  zest 
for  food  is  one  of  the  joys  of  life;  but  it  is  easily 
misled,  rapidly  becomes  confused  in  the  midst 
of  excess,  and  is  quite  certainly  perverted  as  the 
result  of  disease.  The  farther  man  departs  from 
the  serenity  of  the  primitive  life,  the  more  cer- 
tainly he  must  rely  upon  cultured  reason,  and 
the  less  safe  does  he  become  under  the  leadings 
of  desire. 

Appetite  normally  reaches  a  stage  of  almost 
irresistible  intensity,  especially  in  the  boy,  during 
the  period  of  rapid  growth  and  development 
between  thirteen  and  seventeen.  Youth  and  maid 
at  this  time  need  food,  increased  quantities  of 
food;  and  the  demand  is  so  urgent  that  almost 
anything  to  eat  is  good,  just  so  there  is  enough 
of  it !  During  these  ravenous  years  eating  habits 
are  largely  formed,  and  often  through  the  future 
years  those  dishes  " which  mother  made,"  prob- 
ably quite  fit  and  proper  for  the  robust,  energetic 
boy,  stimulate  the  business  or  professional  man 
or  the  housewife  to  food  excesses,  because  of  the 
lasting  influence  upon  appetite  of  those  joyous 
food  associations  of  youth.  Years  after  the  foods 
needed  by  the  growing  body  are  no  longer  safe 
because  of  changed  habits  of  life,  they  continue 
to  tickle  the  palate — and  this  is  as  far  as  the 
average  eater  thinks.  Particularly  fatal  is  that 
appetite  earned  by  the  youth  in  the  gymnasium, 
in  field  sports,  in  the  factory  or  on  the  farm, 
which  he  adopts  as  his  counsellor  in  the  sedentary 
after-years ;  and  this  single  defect  in  rational  eat- 
ing annually  accounts  for  tens  of  thousands  of 


76    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

untimely  deaths  in  the  higher  ranks  of  success 
and  usefulness.  It  would  seem  that  in  a  matter 
so  vitally  connected  with  health,  efficiency  and 
comfort,  physician  and  intelligent  layman  would 
be  keenly  alive  to  the  situation,  but  the  eating 
abominations  go  on  unrecognised  and  devastating. 
In  so  many  departments  of  life  we  are  looking 
for  and  demanding  the  latest  knowledge.  Prog- 
ress and  improvement  are  the  order  of  the  day, 
system  is  being  introduced  into  factory  and  office 
and  home  that  life  may  be  more  productive,  and 
yet  we  eat  what  we  want,  many  of  us  never  getting 
away  from  the  food  desires  and  antipathies 
formed  in  our  youth,  and  passing  on  to  our  chil- 
dren the  same  thoughtless  methods. 

Dietary  Perversions. — 'The  appetite  may  be  as 
unreasonable  in  its  dislikes  as  in  its  desires:  "I 
can't  eat  turnips ;"  "I  don't  like  buttermilk ; " 
1 1  My  appetite  does  not  call  for  that  kind  of  diet ; ' ' 
"My  mother  never  could  eat  eggs;"  "I  got  sick 
on  fish  once,  and  never  have  tasted  any  since." 
Who  is  free  from  some  food  antipathy  not  an 
outgrowth  of  true  knowledge,  not  based  upon  the 
laws  of  nutrition,  but  the  result  of  a  whim,  a  pre- 
judice or  an  accidental  dislike?  It  is  common  in 
the  treatment  of  serious  nervousness  to  hear  the 
patient  assert  his  inability  to  take  milk.  His 
mother  before  him  could  not  drink  milk,  and  he 
had  to  be  weaned  before  he  was  a  year  old  because 
milk  disagreed  with  him.  He  does  not  recognise 
that  he  is  confessing  a  fundamental  digestive 
deficiency.  Of  all  known  constructive  foods,  milk 
is  the  simplest,  the  most  innoxious,  the  most 


EATING  FOR  EFFICIENCY  77 

responsive  to  normal  digestion;  and  to  be  unable 
to  handle  this  simple  food  indicates  a  perversion 
which  should  cause  him  to  seek  counsel.  Health 
will  improve  hand  in  hand  with  the  ability  to 
comfortably  subsist  on  milk,  and  there  is  no  one 
who  cannot  be  readily  taught  to  benefit  by  an 
addition  of  "milk  to  his  diet,  if  he  will  displace 
antagonism  and  preconceptions  by  determination 
(and  Vichy!). 

It  is  unfortunate  that  man's  mind  is  able,  even 
though  dimly  and  inaccurately,  to  keep  track  of 
what  is  going  on  in  his  stomach.  Particularly 
unfortunate  is  this  for  the  nervous  sufferer.  We 
have  recognised  that  there  is  no  sensation  which 
may  not  be  an  expression  of  nervous  oversensi- 
tiveness.  Attention  to  any  organ  or  part  only 
increases  our  consciousness  of  its  condition  and 
actions.  Nervous  indigestion  so  frequently  re- 
ferred to  is  not  in  itself  a  disease.  It  is  but  a 
localised  expression  of  general  nervous  inade- 
quacy. The  nervousness  of  nervous  indigestion 
is  but  the  patient's  oversensitiveness  and  in- 
creased consciousness  of  what  is  occurring  in  his 
digestive  tract,  although  very  often  these  sensa- 
tions are  increased  by  the  food  decomposition  of 
autointoxication  or  the  overacidity  of  fermenta- 
tion, for  in  most  instances  the  nervous  patient 
is  a  sufferer  from  defective  digestive  force.  The 
damage  to  the  patient's  nerves  growing  out  of  his 
unwise  attention  to  and  concentration  upon  his 
stomach  and  intestines  is  frequently  only  less 
hurtful  than  that  resulting  from  the  food-intoxi- 
cation. The  neurotic's  study  of  what  is  going  on 


78    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

below  his  diaphragm  is  of  a  most  disconcerting 
and  depressing  character,  and  his  investigations 
but  add  fuel  to  his  nervousness. 

There  are  few  nervous  dyspeptics  who  do  not 
early  learn  the  air- swallowing  habit — the  habit  of 
gulping  down  a  mouthful  of  air  and  immediately 
forcing  it  back  in  an  effort  to  relieve  a  heaviness 
of  the  stomach.  Those  having  the  habit  usually 
protest  with  emphasis  that  they  do  not  swallow 
air,  that  they  are  just  relieving  the  stomach  of 
gas,  which  forms  in  such  quantities  that  five  to 
thirty  minutes  are  spent  after  meals  "getting  rid" 
of  it.  Nine-tenths  of  this  so-called  gas  is  noth- 
ing but  swallowed  air,  gulped  down  and  belched 
up,  a  habit  easily  acquired  by  humans  and  horses, 
and  which  in  the  quadruped  knocks  a  cool  hundred 
off  his  value.  The  physician  who  attempts  to 
assist  his  patient  in  overcoming  this  miserable 
habit  usually  meets  with  indignant  protests,  and 
with  resentment  in  old  offenders  who  have  been 
playing  with  their  stomachs  in  this  way  for  ten 
or  twenty  years.  Some  air  is  always  swallowed 
with  food,  and  in  mixing  in  the  stomach  acid  and 
alkaline  foods,  some  gas  will  certainly  be  formed. 
The  amount  of  this,  however,  is  comparatively 
small,  and  will  be  spontaneously  expelled.  The 
habit  of  churning  air  in  and  out  of  the  stomach 
is  one  which  proves  inevitably  damaging. 

Other  nervous  dyspeptics  complain  that  every- 
thing they  eat  sours.  Again  we  discover  that 
they  have  been  telephoning  to  their  interior  when 
they  should  have  been  paying  attention  to  the 
singing  of  the  birds  and  the  washing  of  the  dishes. 


EATING  FOB  EFFICIENCY  79 

But  when  the  wise  doctor  assures  them  that  a 
normal  stomach  is  sour,  he  is  usually  thought,  if 
not  called,  a  fool.  Yet  he  is  right.  The  gastric 
juice  is  literally  as  "sour  as  vinegar. "  It  con- 
tains hydrochloric  acid,  and  the  man  whose  stom- 
ach lacks  this  intensely  sour  acid  is  in  a  bad  way. 
But  another  says:  "My  stomach  is  as  sour  as 
vinegar  and  as  bitter  as  gall.  I  cannot  conceive 
that  this  is  a  natural  condition.*'  Yet  the 
daintiest  morsel  of  the  breast  of  the  quail  must 
become  '  '  as  sour  as  vinegar  and  as  bitter  as  gall, ' ' 
or  the  stomach  has  failed  in  its  duty.  All  pro- 
tein foods,  when  normally  acted  upon  by  the 
gastric  juice,  are  converted  into  an  acid,  sour, 
intensely  bitter  fluid  called  peptone.  Air-swal- 
lowers  are  very  prone,  in  their  mischievous  man- 
ipulations of  their  internals,  to  bring  up  portions 
of  partially  or  completely  digested  food,  sour  and 
bitter;  thoroughly  convinced  that  everything 
inside  is  hopelessly  and  totally  wrong,  they  pile 
in  soda  mints  or  digestive  elixirs  to  correct  an 
already  normal  digestion. 

There  are  sour  stomachs  which  stand  for  fer- 
mentation and  not  for  normal  digestion.  Ex- 
cesses in  most  sweets  frequently  result  in  a  sour- 
ness which  is  vinegar  in  truth,  while  in  the 
overloaded  stomach  the  oils  and  greases  may 
undergo  changes  similar  to  those  which  occur  in 
the  formation  of  rancid  butter,  liberating  irri- 
tating and  damaging  acids.  Let  the  poor  sufferer 
cease  his  unpleasant,  ignorant  and  harmful 
investigations  of  his  stomach,  and  realise  that 
gas  and  acid  and  bitterness  are  normal  in  the 


80    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

healthiest  and  strongest  during  digestion.  These 
same  unwise  and  inquisitive  peepers  into  Nature's 
business  are  apt  to  make  the  eventful  discovery 
that  they  cannot  drink  milk  without  its  being 
turned  into  curds.  Neither  could  Adam  (if  he 
got  any),  nor  Ham,  nor  Moses,  nor  Napoleon, 
nor  the  healthiest  baby  nor  the  biggest-muscled 
athlete.  Nature  provides  the  stomach  with  a 
special  secretion  having  no  other  purpose  than 
to  curdle  milk  into  nice,  fine  curds,  which  melt  in 
the  normal  gastric  juice  as  a  snowflake  on  the 
cheek  of  health.  The  amount  of  damaging  anxiety 
which  comes  to  mothers  of  normal  babies  who,  in 
the  midst  of  health  and  plenty  and  unseasonable 
shakings,  gurgle  and  smilingly  laugh  out  a  mouth- 
ful of  soft  curds,  is  only  surpassed  by  the  self- 
harm  done  by  self-centred  grown-ups  who  have 
paid  more  attention  to  their  stomach's  business 
than  to  their  own. 

So  again  a  little  knowledge  becomes  a  danger- 
ous thing.  A  few  misinterpreted  truths  and  food 
superstitions  limit  and  pervert  the  eating  habits 
of  thousands  of  our  otherwise  intelligent  and 
progressive  neighbours.  Too  many  of  the  nerv- 
ous do  daily  homage  at  the  altars  of  their 
stomachs  that  would  put  to  shame  the  zeal  of  the 
Hindoo  devotee  before  his  clay  god.  Sooner  or 
later  all  should  wisely  adjust  the  balance  between 
food  and  work,  but  the  nervous  should  be  advised 
with  emphasis  either  to  remain  profoundly  igno- 
rant of  any  knowledge  of  their  digestive  processes, 
or  to  seek  and  be  guided  by  wise  professional 
counsel.  From  our  previous  discussion  it  should 


EATING  FOR  EFFICIENCY  81 

be  clear  to  the  victim  of  nerves  that  through  a 
wise  choice  of  food  he  may  materially  assist  in 
overcoming  his  nervousness.  He  will  recognise 
the  necessity  of  making  some  definite  changes  in 
his  eating  habits,  of  substituting  likes  for  dis- 
likes, and  of  emphasising  his  self-mastery  through 
denial. 


CHAPTER  VIII 
EATING  FOR  EFFICIENCY— Continued 

Right  Use  of  Sweets. — The  first  nutritional 
damage  which  later  develops  nervousness  most 
frequently  has  its  origin  in  the  abuse  of  sweets. 
This  type  of  food,  when  needed,  is  one  most 
quickly  and  economically  converted  into  energy. 
Most  of  the  sweets  are  readily  soluble,  and  the 
digestive  processes  necessary  to  prepare  them  for 
the  tissues  are  comparatively  simple.  Through 
the  ages,  however,  sweets  were  relatively  rare. 
Honey  and  the  fruits  were  sufficient  to  provide 
mankind  with  but  a  small  percentage  of  what  he 
could  have  profitably  and  healthfully  used,  and 
so  the  desire  for  sugar  acquired  an  intensity  which 
is  now  a  human  characteristic.  Within  recent 
generations,  only,  have  systematic  planting  and 
improved  processes  of  agriculture,  with  economi- 
cal methods  of  extraction  and  purification,  ren- 
dered this  food,  once  worth  its  weight  in  silver, 
as  cheap  as  the  proverbial  dirt.  Never  had  man- 
kind so  bountiful  a  supply  of  sweets,  and  never 
so  little  need  for  this  form  of  food  as  to-day. 

The  inherited  love  of  sweets  is  so  strong,  the 
evidences  of  the  joy  they  bring  our  children  so 
obvious,  and  the  deliciousness  of  the  multiplied 
forms  in  which  they  are  now  prepared  so  un- 


y 


EATING  FOB  EFFICIENCY  83 

questioned,  that  it  is  small  wonder  that  children, 
large  and  small,  are  overfed  with  them.  Sugar 
in  endless  variety  tempts  young  and  old  at  every 
turn,  though  needed  only  in  limited  amounts  by 
the  muscle-worker,  and  in  decidedly  less  quantity 
by  children  and  all  who  are  living  lives  of  nervous 
and  mental  activity.  The  damage  from  abuse  of 
this  appealing  and  seductive  food  may  be  far- 
reaching.  Sweets  in  excess  may  keep  the_entire 
digestive  tract  in  a^state  of  acidity,  an  acidity 
which  provides  the  soil  for  the  growth  and  devel- 
opment in  the  small  intestines  of  germs  which 
normally  have  no  place  in  the  body  excepting  in 
the  lower  bowel.  Thus  through  excessive  eating 
of  sweets  many  children  grow  into  maturity  with 
their  intestinal  digestion  perverted  through  years 
of  overindulgence  in  candy,  cakes,  syrups,  over- 
sweetened  fruits,  cereals  and  "what  not."  Girls 
of  the  boarding-school  age  in  their  budding  love- 
liness are  the  natural  objects  of  love  missiles  — 
delectable  two-  and  five-pound  boxes  of  chocolates 
and  bon-bons.  To  eat  before  bedtime  a  half- 
pound  of  the  richest  sweets  that  can  be  devised 
by  the  confectioner's  art  is  no  stunt  for  our 
modern  maid.  Yet  she  has  swallowed  a  half- 
pound  of  highly  concentrated  food,  useless  in 
producing  constructive  tissue,  but  capable  of  elab- 
orating force  and  heat  —  sufficient  food  to  provide 
the  strength  and  bodily  warmth  necessary  for  two 
days'  arduous  labours  for  a  Chinese  coolie. 
What  is  the  effect  of  such  masses  of  high-potency 
foods  in  the  undeveloped  digestive  organism  of 
the  brain-working  girl  but  to  waste  digestive 


84    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

force,  to  clog  the  organs  of  elimination,  to  slowly 
but  surely  corrode  the  vital  machinery? 

A  certain  ignorant  conception  of  sweets  places 
them  as  the  opposite  of  acids.  Sweet  is  certainly 
the  antagonist  of  sour  as  recorded  by  the  palate, 
but  the  palate  knows  no  chemistry.  The  citric 
acid  of  the  lemon,  orange  and  the  grapefruit 
becomes  an  alkaline  citrate  in  the  fluids  of  the 
body,  if  given  a  decent  chance.  But  the  palate 
says  the  grapefruit  is  acid  and  the  sugar  is  sweet, 
therefore,  neutralise  the  sour  of  the  grapefruit 
by  the  sweet  of  the  sugar.  We  have  already 
learned  that  excess  of  sugar,  sweet  though  it  may 
be  as  it  slips  between  palate  and  tongue,  deliciously 
succulent,  as  a  matter  of  fact  rapidly  becomes 
vinegar  if  taken  in  excess.  Many  who  for  years 
have  denied  themselves  the  morning  orange  or 
grapefruit  because  of  its  objectionable  "  acidity " 
will  find  that  this  will  disappear  if  they  eat  their 
fruits  unsweetened  by  sugar — this,  of  course, 
provided  they  can  accept  the  statements  of  science 
on  this  question,  because  when  all  has  been  said 
and  done,  the  nervous  sufferer  is  largely  con- 
trolled by  his  beliefs ;  and  we  have  just  seen  that 
he  can  always  find  acid  in  his  stomach,  if  that 
will  prove  his  case. 

Living  lives  of  muscular  disuse  and  nervous 
stress  as  most  of  us  do  these  days,  with  sweets 
offered  us  in  such  excess  of  our  real  needs  for 
even  so  valuable  a  food,  it  would  be  well  for  us 
to  adopt  a  few  simple  rules  for  our  protection. 
One  spoonful  or  one  lump  to  the  cup  of  tea  or 
coffee,  none  on  our  cereal,  and  the  avoidance  of 


EATING  FOR  EFFICIENCY  85 

f rait  that  is  not  sufficiently  sweet  to  be  eaten  un- 
sugared,  candy  only  in  the  place  of  dessert  and 
the  avoidance  of  all  richly  sweetened  dishes — 
these  restrictions  will  help  much  in  our  fight  for 
efficiency.  Many  youthful  ills  would  not  appear 
if  children  were  protected  from  the  formation 
of  the  sweet  crave,  at  least  until  the  secondary 
muscular  development  of  puberty  provides  the 
furnace  needed.  A  few  weeks  of  resolute  self- 
denial  on  the  part  of  any  one  seriously  desiring 
to  escape  the  mastery  of  sweets — for  this  abuse 
develops  a  craving  not  unlike  that  for  tobacco 
or  alcohol — will  result  in  a  gratifying  realisation 
of  the  rapidity  with  which  the  appetite  will  learn 
to  enjoy  moderately  sweetened  foods.  A  child 
properly  reared  in  reference  to  this  question  never 
suffers  from  that  intense  eagerness,  that  almost 
insatiable  crave,  which  by  many  is  considered  a 
command  of  the  appetite  asserting  a  need.  Pro- 
longed misuse  of  the  sugars  and  under-exercise 
frequently  results  in  one  of  the  most  miserable 
forms  of  autointoxication,  spoken  of  by  physicians 
as  "  green  bile  cases, "  in  which  even  the  gall- 
bladder and  ducts  of  the  liver  have  become  in- 
fected by  the  same  germs,  which  could  not  have 
developed  in  the  upper  intestines  had  it  not  been 
for  the  years  of  sugar-produced  overacidity. 
Such  patients  are  particularly  subject  to  periodic 
attacks  of  mental  depression.  Their  multiplied 
pounds  of  sugar  have  failed  to  sweeten  their  dis- 
positions. 

Let  nothing  which  has  been  said  in  reference 
to  the  abuse  of  sweets  be  taken  as  an  objection 


86    THE  MASTEBY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

to  the  legitimate  use  of  a  reasonable  amount  of 
this  food  by  all  who  exercise.  An  earned  dessert 
is  a  most  wholesome  and  welcome  addition  to  the 
meal.  Even  to  active  growing  children,  sweets 
should  not  be  given  except  in  small  amounts,  and 
after  other  wholesome  food  has  been  taken.  The 
sugar- eating  habit  is  particularly  in  evidence  in 
those  homes  where  children  are  allowed  to 
"piece"  between  meals  on  cakes,  cookies,  candies 
and  preserves ;  and  this  habit  in  children,  as  well 
as  in  adults,  rapidly  displaces  the  desire  for  more 
simple,  wholesome  foods. 

Right  Use  of  Proteids. — The  second  modern 
eating  error  which  wrecks  nerves  is  the  misuse 
of  the  protein  foods,  especially  the  abuse  of  meats. 
The  growing  child  needs  protein,  not  necessarily 
in  the  form  of  pork  and  beef,  as  simpler  and  less 
damaging  proteins  are  found  in  milk,  eggs  and 
vegetables.  All  muscle  workers  must  have  pro- 
tein in  some  form  to  replace  tissue,  as  this  is  the 
only  food  which  can  replenish  the  protoplasm 
of  the  cell,  and  in  all  activities  of  the  body,  cells 
are  being  destroyed  and  must  be  replaced  by  new 
ones.  The  controversy  over  the  use  and  abuse, 
the  value  and  damage,  of  a  meat  diet,  is  an  old 
one.  Its  advocates  point  with  conviction  to  the 
energetic,  meat-eating  Caucasians  as  being  the 
world-conquerors,  and  compare  the  strength  and 
aggressiveness  of  the  carnivorous  lion  and  tiger 
with  the  docile  meekness  of  the  vegetarian  donkey 
and  lamb.  The  opponents  of  meat  point  with 
equal  conviction  to  the  hardihood  and  endurance 
and  the  ability  and  the  capacity  of  certain 


EATING  FOR  EFFICIENCY  87 

branches  of  the  rice-eating  yellow  race,  to  the 
strength  and  longevity  of  the  elephant,  and  darkly 
hint  that  the  explanation  of  the  rapid  increase 
in  appendicitis  and  cancer  will  ultimately  be  laid 
at  the  door  of  much  meat-eating.  We  shall  not 
pretend  to  decide  this  question  for  the  man  in 
the  street,  but  for  the  nervous  sufferer  a  few 
definite  truths  may  be  educed. 

Our  long-lived  forefathers,  whose  brawn  and 
muscle  pushed  back  the  frontier  state  by  state, 
wringing  from  the  reluctant  wilds  a  halting  sus- 
tenance, using  their  wits  some,  their  physical 
forces  much,  lived  and  thrived  upon  a  diet  largely 
of  meat ;  and  our  fathers  believed  in  meat,  and  we 
were  reared  on  meat.  But  our  fathers  were  not 
quite  so  comfortable  as  the  frontiersmen,  and  we 
are  trying  to  avoid  nervous  wreckage.  Unlike 
the  damage  from  sugars,  the  harm  from  meat- 
eating  rarely  comes  in  youth.  Meat  properly 
prepared,  in  reasonable  amounts,  is  well  appro- 
priated by  the  growing  body.  The  danger  comes 
in  later  years.  With  the  small  amount  of  tissue 
destruction  in  the  comparatively  inactive  lives  of 
business  and  professional  men,  meat  becomes  a 
drug  in  early  maturity.  Good  digestion  and  good 
kidneys  will  take  care  of  it  for  many  years,  but 
meat  is  an  acid-producer,  and  unmerited  red 
meats,  especially,  are  subject  to  decomposition  in 
the  intestinal. tract  in  all  who  have  not  aggressive 
stomach  digestion;  and  such  digestion  is  rarely 
long  enjoyed  by  those  who  are  not  earning  it  by 
muscle  work.  This  particular  decay  of  meats, 
common  in  the  middle-aged  and  old  who  indulge 


88          THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

in  excess  of  this  type  of  food,  is  evidenced  by  a 
breath  which  is  distinctly  characteristic  and 
offensive.  For  the  man  who  would  be  truly  effi- 
cient in  counting-house  and  office  and  study  and 
pulpit,  reduction  in  the  amount  of  meat,  even 
the  elimination  of  all  meat,  may  be  instituted  as 
a  definite  step  toward  conservation  of  strength 
and  increase  of  health  and  nervous  comfort. 
That  unreasoning  tyrant,  the  appetite,  will  resent 
this  change,  and  the  resolution  must  be  strong 
if  reason  is  to  succeed,  for  the  meat-eating  habit 
is  often  deeply  ingrained.  However,  a  few  days 
only  of  discomfort  need  be  experienced  by  those 
who  decide  that  they  will  eliminate  this  toxin- 
producing,  nerve-harassing  meat  excess;  and  it 
is  remarkable  how  quickly  simple,  properly  pre- 
pared foods  will  replace  the  roasts,  steaks  and 
cutlets  of  beef  and  mutton,  if  resolution  attends 
on  decision.  Meat  of  fowl  or  fish,  properly 
cooked,  is  a  distinctly  wiser  diet  for  the  nerves 
than  pork  in  any  form,  or  excess  of  beef  or  even 
of  mutton  and  veal.  All  white  meats  are  con- 
sidered less  irritating  in  their  ultimate  effect  upon 
the  nervous  system  than  the  dark  or  red  meats. 

Use  and  Abuse  of  Fats. — The  fats  and  oils  pro- 
duce much  more  heat  and  energy,  weight  for 
weight,  than  any  other  food.  They  also  require 
more  digestive  force  to  prepare  them  for  the 
body's  use.  In  our  country,  the  chief  damage 
from  this  type  of  foods  results  from  unwise  mix- 
tures of  grease  in  combinations  which  retard  or 
interfere  with  the  digestion  of  other  articles  of 
diet.  A  steak  which  has  been  saturated  with  hot 


BATING  FOB  EFFICIENCY  89 

lard  or  the  cotton-seed  products  now  commonly 
used  in  frying  will  remain  in  the  stomach  nearly 
twice  as  long  as  it  would  if  ibroiled  rare.  Flour 
in  the  form  of  bread  properly  baked  digests 
easily.  The  same  flour  mixed  with  lard  and  eaten 
as  hot  biscuit  is  only  digested  by  a  special  effort, 
and  after  a  delay  which  too  often  permits  fer- 
mentation. Many  nervous  disturbances  unques- 
tionably result  from  the  damage  to  normal  diges- 
tion caused  by  these  unwise  mixtures  of  grease 
with  foods  which  would  otherwise  be  easily  cared 
for  by  the  digestive  tract.  Butter  and  cream 
are  wholesome,  quite  digestible  and  most  excellent 
forms  of  fat  for  food  use ;  still,  all  fats  in  excess 
of  the  needs  of  the  body  tend  either  to  accumulate 
in  the  form  of  undesirable  adipose,  or  to  interfere 
with  the  whole  digestive  serenity  through  the 
excess  of  fatty  acids  produced  and  liberated  dur- 
ing disturbed  digestion.  Again  it  is  the  question 
of  adjusting  food  to  the  needs  of  the  system  as 
a  whole,  and  nuts  and  rich  gravies  and  mayonnaise 
and  French  dressing  and  ice-cream  and  fried 
cakes,  called  goodies  by  the  wilful  palate,  may  be 
taken  in  excess  only  under  a  threat,  too  often 
executed,  of  nervous  injury.  Cooking  ingenuity 
has  been  stimulated  as  the  world  has  shrunk  from 
impassable  distances  to  an  affair  of  neighbour- 
hoods, and  as  to-day  the  nations  fairly  rub  elbows, 
the  ideas  and  tastes  and  luxuries  of  all  lands  are 
becoming  common  property,  and  foods  more  and 
more  complex,  and  by  the  man  of  the  world  and 
his  wife  elaborate  menus  are  expected.  Every 
step  that  we  depart  from  simplicity  in  food  is. 


90    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

a  stride  nearer  to  indigestibility,  and  all  forms 
of  indigestion  leave  a  harmful  residue,  to  be  ab- 
sorbed and  thrown  off,  if  the  organs  are  sufficiently 
strong,  otherwise,  to  remain  and  damage. 

Oversoluble  Foods. — Lacking  in  common  sense, 
the  palate  has  attained  a  degree  of  sensitiveness 
rivalling  that  of  a  virtuoso  or  prima  donna,  to 
humour  which  the  miller  grinds  his  cereals  finer 
and  finer,  the  butcher  trims  his  meats  and  roasts 
more  closely,  the  cook  has  multiplied  utensils  to 
mince  and  pulverise  and  crush  and  mash,  to  the 
end  that  all  that  comes  to  the  table  may  be  super- 
latively smooth  and  delicate  and  soft.  As  a 
result,  much  of  our  food  is  quite  too  soluble,  too 
completely  dissolved,  and  quite  too  fully  absorbed, 
leaving  an  insufficient  residue  of  insoluble  mat- 
ter. Man's  intestinal  tract  normally  requires  a 
relatively  large  proportion  of  insoluble  material. 
Many  vegetables  contain  such  a  substance  in  the 
form  of  cellulose,  as  for  example,  the  bran  of 
wheat,  the  hull  of  sweet  corn,  the  pod  of  the  string- 
bean,  the  peel  of  apples  and  potatoes;  but  these 
are  pared  or  strained  or  bolted  away  before  the 
food  reaches  the  modern  table.  And,  as  a  result, 
overabsorption  takes  place,  substances  enter  the 
system  which  otherwise  would  not  be  taken  up, 
and  the  residue  is  often  so  small  as  to  render 
sluggishness  of  the  lower  intestinal  tract  habitual. 
For  these  reasons  it  is  well  for  those  suffering  any 
degree  of  autointoxication  or  sluggishness  of  the 
bowels  to  provide  for  more  insoluble  matter  in 
their  daily  food.  One  of  the  simplest  and  most 
convenient  methods  of  compensating  for  this 


EATING  FOR  EFFICIENCY  91 

modern  food  defect  is  the  daily  use  of  one  or  two 
table  spoonfuls  of  coarse  wheat  bran,  which  is 
improved  in  flavour  by  toasting  to  a  moderate 
brown.  This  is  easily  taken  when  added  to  the 
breakfast  food,  and  it  is  quite  a  palatable  dish 
served  with  a  sprinkle  of  salt  and  moistened  with 
cream.  When  the  need  for  insoluble  food  is  very 
marked,  it  is  well  to  use  the  bran  for  breakfast 
and  an  extra  tablespoonful  at  bedtime.  The 
habit  of  starting  breakfast  with  citrus  fruits,  as 
orange  or  grapefruit,  is  also  of  great  assistance 
to  those  who  find  a  sluggish  bowel  condition  the 
cause  of  nervous  disturbance. 

Drugs  as  Foods. — Even  as  the  tide  of  contro- 
versy has  ebbed  and  flowed  on  the  question  of 
eating  or  not  eating  meat,  so  with  more  intensity, 
acrimony,  and  often  with  even  less  logic,  the  use 
of  tea,  coffee,  tobacco  and  alcohol  has  been  argued. 
These  are  not  true  foods,  although  through  the 
influence  of  the  powerful  chemicals  which  they 
contain  they  unquestionably  influence  digestion 
and  nutrition.  But  it  is  not  for  this  limited,  often 
questionable  value,  that  they  are  used.  The 
stable,  poised  man  and  woman  have  no  need  and 
feel  none  for  any  of  these  drugs,  which  tempor- 
arily relieve  sensations  of  depression,  disability, 
irritability — temporarily  relieve.  Not  being  real 
foods,  and  lacking  the  inherent  value  of  the  foods 
they  replace,  they  ultimately  reduce  efficiency. 
To  the  unstrung,  food-poisoned  neurotic  they  all 
offer  passing,  seductive  comfort.  "They  cry' 
'Peace,  peace!'  when  there  is  no  peace.*'  In 
moderate  amounts  the  healthy  body  may  care  for 


92    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

these  drugs  without  apparent  damage.  There  are 
centenarians  who  ascribe  their  longevity  to  tea, 
to  coffee,  to  tobacco  or  to  alcohol ;  there  are  others 
who  claim  to  have  lived  their  hundred  years  of 
health  because  they  used  none  of  these.  But  the 
individual  case  is  not  a  proper  example  to  be 
used  in  an  argument  of  the  relation  of  food  to 
health.  Few  will  question  the  evidence  of  national 
and  insurance  statistics  indicating  strongly  that 
the  many  who  daily  depend  upon  these  food  drugs 
are  distanced  in  life's  race  in  health  of  body  and 
vigour  of  offspring  by  the  total  abstainers.  The 
more  nervous  the  race,  the  more  dependent  we 
find  the  individual  upon  some  form  of  drug  ease. 
The  evidence  of  the  nervous  damage  growing  out 
of  unrestrained  excess  of  any  of  these  substances 
is  so  incriminating  as  to  render  detailed  discussion 
on  this  point  superfluous. 

Excess  of  salt  and  condiments — in  fact,  all 
forms  of  high  seasoning — is  generally  used  to 
whip  up  a  flagging  appetite,  to  stimulate  the 
palate  to  accept  that  which  even  its  ignorance  does 
not  crave.  Delicacy  of  taste  is  thereby  rapidly 
lost,  thus  developing  a  vicious  circle — the  harm- 
ful increasing  the  demand  for  that  which  harms. 
Excessive  secretion  of  mucus  is  the  stomach's 
protection  from  such  insults,  and  this  retards 
digestion.  Even  the  remote  kidneys  are  made 
much  more  susceptible  to  harmful  changes, 
Bright 's  disease  being  invited  through  overuse  of 
salt.  A  normal,  hearty  appetite  is  the  safest 
sauce  for  any  meal,  and  the  steak  that  has  to  be 
showered  witji  Worcestershire  and  the  vegetables 


EATING  FOR  EFFICIENCY  93 

which  are  acceptable  only  when  spiced  with 
Cayenne  are  a  double  menace,  not  only  to  diges- 
tion but  to  ultimate  nervous  efficiency. 

Efficient  Eating. — Until  recently  physiologists 
taught  the  avoidance  of  water  drinking  with 
meals.  For  many  years  all  teachers  have  encour- 
aged those  suffering  from  most  dietary  defects  to 
drink  more  water,  but  to  shun  fluids  at  meal  time 
as  a  real  danger.  It  is  now  known  that  the  gastric 
juice,  which  our  fathers  feared  would  thus  be 
diluted,  is  not  secreted  ^f  or ^  at  lejasi  a  Jtialf .  hour  ' 
after  eating,  while  fluids  are  absorbed  directly  by ' 
the  stomach  wall  before  this  time.  Insufficient 
water  drinking  is  a  fault  of  many  of  the  nervous. 
Water  should  never  be  used  in  the  place  of  mas- 
tication to  wash  down  foods  which  require  chew- 
ing, but  one  to  three  glasses  of  water  with  each 
meal  is  regarded  to-day  as  an  actual  aid  to  diges- 
tion. There  are  few  who  will  not  benefit  by 
increasing  the  total  amount  of  pure  water  taken 
daily. 

In  many  lives  the  stomach  is  a  literal  "  beast 
of  burden. "  At  any  time,  without  rhyme  or 
reason,  it  is  loaded  with  a  heterogeneous  mess. 
Eebel  it  does,  but  unfortunately  all  too  rarely  in 
comparison  with  the  abuses  it  receives.  Modern 
society  makes  demands  upon  digestion  only  less 
barbarous  than  the  orgies  of  the  heathen.  At 
morning  functions,  afternoon  functions,  evening 
functions,  foods  are  served  which  would  tax  the 
digestion  of  a  hod-carrier.  The  richest  of  salads, 
spiked  punch  and  afternoon  tea,  cakes,  creams 
and  bonbons,  sandwiches  fairly  oozing  richness, 


94    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

are  all  smilingly  downed,  with  compliments  to 
"mine  host."  Many  are  so  weak  of  will  or  mind 
as  to  be  unable  to  go  from  one  meal  to  another 
without  pop-corn  or  peanuts,  ice-cream  sodas  or 
phosphates,  beer  'and  sandwiches,  or  cake  and 
preserves.  To  press  food  or  wine  upon  every 
guest  is  still  a  common  standard  of  hospitality 
— a  pride  of  entertainment  which  ignores  possible 
discomfort  or  damage.  Eegularity  in  food  in- 
sures for  the  stomach  some  of  that  habitual  cer- 
tainty of  action,  the  lack  of  which  in  heart  con- 
trol would  have  long  since  eliminated  the  majority 
of  the  human  race.  Not  that  any  normal 
individual  should  convert  himself  into  a  time- 
indicator  and  be  a  slaye  to  the  clock ;  but  reason- 
able regularity,  essential  moderateness  and  sim- 
plicity in  foods  promise  health,  comfort  and 
nervous  efficiency.  There  is  no  question  but  that 
the  healthy  man  can  with  practical  impunity  go 
on  a  food  spree  now  and  then.  At  his  alumni 
banquet,  on  the  trip  back  to  the  old  home  farm, 
at  the  hunting  camp,  and  on  other  state  occasions, 
he  can  digest  and  assimilate  even  an  excess  with 
comfort' — provided  he  has  earned  his  reserve  of 
force.  But  many  live  too  close  to  their  margin 
for  this.  Many  more  live  chronically  toxic,  and 
food  excesses  but  hasten  the  day  of  reckoning  and 
retribution.  He  who  earns  his  bread  by  the  sweat 
of  his  brow  needs  three  good,  hearty  meals.  The 
brain-worker  is  distinctly  better  off  with  two.  A 
simple  breakfast,  as  one  of  fruit,  cereal,  eggs, 
potatoes  and  toast ;  a  lunch  of  a  whole-wheat  bread 
sandwich  and  buttermilk,  and  a  four-  or  five- 


EATING  FOR  EFFICIENCY  95 

course  dinner  with  a  small  portion  of  one  of  the 
milder  meats,  will  bring  him  to  the  end  of  a  year 
in  obviously  better  condition,  more  fit  for  the 
cares  and  demands  of  life,  distinctly  more  clear- 
brained  and  nervously  comfortable,  than  is  pos- 
sible upon  three  heavy  meals  in  imitation  of  his 
muscle-worker  brother.  There  are  some  in  whom 
overeating  is  a  disease  which  becomes  a  veritable 
food-mania,  with  demands  as  insatiable  and  un- 
reasonable as  those  of  the  drunkard  for  his  cups, 
and  overeating  will  probably  always  be  associated 
with  under-thinking,  and  high  living  with  low 
efficiency. 

Babies  are  properly  fed  on  a  strict  milk  diet 
eight  times  a  day  at  first,,  then  seven,  then  six. 
Many  "  nervous  wrecks "  should  dietetically  be 
taken  back  to  babyhood,  put  to  bed,  and  given  four 
or  five  ounces  of  milk  with  an  ounce  or  two  of 
Vichy-water  eight  times  a  day  for  several  days, 
and  then  with  milk  and  cream  gradually  added, 
and  later  raw  eggs,  be  reeducated  in  their  habits 
of  nutrition,  and  develop  again  as  from  babyhood 
through  childhood.  As  flesh  piles  on — the  evi- 
dence that  nutrition  is  being  restored — gradually 
increasing  exercise  should  be  taken.  And  with 
the  return  of  strength  food  can  be  increased,  until 
in  addition  to  milk  and  eggs,  properly  cooked 
vegetables,  fruits  and  their  natural  juices,  and 
cereals,  offer  a  wholesome,  safe  bill-of-fare  which, 
with  honest  daily  exercise,  will  go  far  toward 
eliminating  all  chemical  and  physical  causes  for 
nervous  deficiency.  There  are  many  so  diges- 
tively  weak  as  to  need  regularly  a  small  feeding 


96    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

of  simple  food  four  to  six  times  daily,  while  more 
would  find  their  ills  rapidly  reduced  by  the 
omission  of  one  meal  and  the  formation  of  the 
two-meal-a-day  habit,  particularly  if  the  service 
of  meat  were  eliminated.  Many  of  the  autotoxic, 
therefore,  should  follow  a  modified  form  of  fast- 
ing, while  many  of  the  undernourished  need  an 
increased  number  of  meals — practically  feasting 
on  the  foods  of  childhood. 

The  appetite  responds  to  cultivation.  He  was 
a  brave  man  who  first  swallowed  a  raw  oyster, 
but  modern  appetites  have  been  educated  to  con- 
sider the  succulent  bivalve  a  delicacy ;  and  yet  the 
bon-vivant  who  would  imperturbably  initiate  a 
dinner  with  a  dozen  raw  Linnhavens,  strains  and 
gags  when  asked  to  swallow  a  raw  egg.  The  real 
food  value  of  the  egg  is  thrice  that  of  the  oyster, 
while  the  danger  of  its  undergoing  intestinal  de- 
composition is  but  a  small  fraction  of  that  existing 
in  the  sea-muck-bred  delicacy.  "Eat  three  olives 
and  you  will  always  like  them."  "Don't  look 
at  the  lobster  until  after  you  have  taken  a  bite. ' ' 
So  we  train  our  appetites  to  enjoy  the  indiges- 
tible s — aristocratic  indigestibles — with  an  assi- 
duity unknown  in  learning  to  enjoy  simple  food. 

Modern  food  preparation  has  taken  away  much 
of  the  work  belonging  to  the  teeth.  Thorough 
mastication  adds  an  element  to  certain  foods  which 
means  much  to  their  ultimate  digestion.  Careful 
mastication  develops  delicacy  of  taste  and  enjoy- 
ment of  flavours  unknown  to  the  gormand  bolter. 
Real  use  of  the  teeth  is  one  of  the  best  preventives 
of  decay,  and  healthy  gums  and  clean  mouths 


EATING  FOR  EFFICIENCY  97 

are  additional  rewards  for  thorough  chewing  of 
foods — foods  not  too  mushy  and  soft  and  fine, 
but  foods  which  give  work  for  the  teeth  to  do. 
Deliberate  eating  is  one  of  the  best  methods  of 
avoiding  overeating.  Eapid  eaters  dump  the  food 
into  their  stomachs  with  such  rapidity  that  dam- 
aging excess  has  been  swallowed  before  the 
appetite  realises  it  is  satisfied.  Eapid  eaters  are 
usually  the  overeaters  who  suffer  from  retarded 
digestion  because  of  the  mechanical  stretching 
of  their  stomach  walls  during  early  life.  Air- 
swallowers  as  well  as  food-gulpers  often  weaken 
the  essential  stomach  contractility  and  thereby 
suffer  from  retarded  digestion  throughout  their 
lives.  An  excellent  plan  to  avoid  the  overeating 
of  those  foods  which  are  particularly  appetising 
is  to  request  a  moderate  service  only,  with  a  de- 
termination that  a  second  service  will  not  be 
accepted.  We  are  apt  to  forget  how  much  has 
gone  before,  and  to  pass  our  plates  the  second  or 
third  time,  finally  having  eaten  a  total  which 
would  have  appalled  us  had  it  been  heaped  in  one 
lot  before  us. 

In  the  final  reckoning,  the  foods  which  ferment, 
such  as  the  sugars  and  starches,  many  vegetables 
and  fruits,  are  ultimately  less  harmful  than  the 
meats  which  putrefy.  And  so  one  of  the  first 
changes  for  the  toxic  sufferer  should  be  the  sub- 
stitution of  fermentable  foods  for  the  foods  of 
putrefaction.  Many  are  undernourished  and 
nervously  half-starved— the  thin  and  anaemic — 
who  have  never  developed,  or  through  abuse  have 
weakened,  their  ability  to  digest  fats.  For  these 


98    THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

a  careful  course  of  dietetic  training  should  be 
considered,  beginning  with  milk  and  Vichy,  then 
adding  cream  and  after  ten  days  three  raw  eggs, 
which  can  be  gradually  increased  to  a  dozen, 
fifteen  or  even  twenty  a  day,  with  often  a  very 
gratifying  increase  in  weight.  The  overfleshy  are 
usually  overindulging  in  sweets  or  fats  and  under- 
exercising.  In  fact,  the  whole  eating  question 
is  so  interrelated  with  that  of  exercise  as  to  make 
any  dietary  rules  of  limited  value  when  not  asso- 
ciated with  plans  for  muscle  use.  One  fundamen- 
tal truth  must  be  reiterated  to  the  nervous  sufferer 
— he  must  eat  to  live  and  not  live  to  eat.  In  the 
very  fact  that  he  is  nervous  exists  much  more 
than  a  hint  that  the  balance  between  food  and 
exercise  is  broken,  and  that  in  food  regulation,  in 
the  wise  adjustment  of  what  he  eats  to  what  he 
does,  he  will  be  able  to  reduce  the  whole  question 
of  the  physical  basis  of  health  to  utter  simplicity. 


CHAPTER  IX 
WORK 

Wits  and  Brawn. — All  mankind  not  utterly  de- 
fective has  something  to  do,  and  the  majority  find 
that  life  holds  for  them  serious  effort.  Civilisa- 
tion saw  its  dawn  in  the  separation  of  those  who 
work  into  two  groups,  the  brain-worker  and  the 
muscle-worker.  The  latter  has  ever  been, by  far 
the  larger  class.  It  has  been  through  dogged, 
unrelenting  tug  and  pull  and  strain  of  muscle  that 
the  great  bulk  of  the  labour  of  mankind  has  been 
executed.  Through  the  greater  portion  of  the 
span  of  centuries,  the  man  of  brawn  has  been 
under  the  mastery  of  the  dominating  minority, 
the  brain-worker.  Slave,  serf,  vassal,  servant — 
the  physically  and  numerically  stronger — have 
executed  the  bid  and  call  of  their  more  keen-witted 
masters.  There  cannot  be  the  slightest  question 
as  to  the  incomparable  advantage  of  brain  over 
brawn.  Under  its  direction  useless,  wasteful, 
dangerous  activities  have  given  place  to  produc- 
tive, economic  and  constructive  effort,  with  the 
result  in  many  lands  to-day,  that  mankind  is  quite 
comfortably  caught  up  with  his  work.  He  has 
passed  the  stage  of  a  hand-to-mouth  existence ;  he 
has  pulled  down  his  barns  and  built  greater.  The 
man  of  brain  is  beginning  to  share  his  plenty 

99 


100       THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

with  the  sons  and  daughters  of  toil,  whose  chil- 
dren are  tasting  some  of  the  advantages  of  his 
children.  Wits  are  multiplying,  and  as  a  result 
of  the  last  century's  unprecedented  advancement 
in  knowledge  and  spread  of  learning,  slavery  has 
disappeared,  serfdom  is  doomed,  and  servants 
hard  to  find. 

It  is  indeed  unreasonable  to  question  the  right 
of  brain  to  lead  and  direct,  and  to  reap  the  fruits 
of  its  knowledge.  But  through  the  centuries 
damage  in  two  forms  has  continually  hovered 
near  to  threaten  or  to  curse  mental  superiority. 
Brain  has  ever  presumed  to  look  down  upon  and 
discredit  muscle,  to  hold  itself  superior,  as  though 
cast  from  a  finer  material  in  a  different  mould; 
and  cruelty  and  brutality  have  hardened  the 
superior  heart,  and  jealousy  and  envy  and  hate 
have  poisoned  the  heart  of  labour ;  and  even  to-day 
the  peace  between  master  and  him  who  serves 
is  too  often  but  a  truce  of  convenience.  And  in 
addition  to  these  unholy  class  distinctions,  brawn 
has  ever  been  subject  to  swift  demoralisation 
through  the  snobbery  of  idleness.  And  what  a 
levelling  factor  this  ever-repeated  result  of  plenty 
has  been!  The  rich  man's  son  is  reared  a  child 
of  luxury;  his  offspring  becomes  a  rake  and  a 
spendthrift ;  then  comes  the  reformation,  initiated 
through  a  generation  or  so  of  poverty  in  response 
to  the  eternal  edict,  "Work  or  starve. "  Ever 
and  again,  through  the  skill  of  cleverness,  the 
necessity  for  true  effort — that  productive  effort 
which  men  call  work — has  been  avoided  by  one  or 
two  generations.  Virtuous  frugality  and  honest, 


WORK    .••   f >  v 

successful  endeavour  have  accumulated  plenty 
and  spread  the  downy  couch  of  idleness  for  their 
children — wit,  success,  ability,  energy,  skill, 
genius  and  mastery  in  this  generation  breeding 
underwork  and  indolence  in  the  next.  Soft- 
palmed  men  and  hothouse  women  throng  life's 
highway  to-day,  caring  and  planning  for  little  but 
their  own  ease  and  amusement,  autocratically 
endeavouring  to  usurp  and  crowd  to  the  by-paths 
their  superiors — the  sons  and  daughters  of  toil 
— arrogantly  drawing  close  their  unearned  skirts 
of  obvious  opulence  as  they  pass  by,  conspicuously 
inferior,  as  is  every  mortal  who  scorns  honest 
work. 

Too  long  have  wealth,  station  and  cleverness 
dominated  and  humiliated,  or  at  best,  patronised 
labour.  But  the  toll  paid  has  been  excessive, 
paid  in  frail,  undeveloped  bodies,  weak  of  muscle, 
tense  of  nerve,  with  underdeveloped,  displaced 
vital  organs,  and  characters  as  relaxed.  In  seek- 
ing its  parasitic  ease,  brain  has  ever  overreached 
itself,  and  ever  has  and  ever  shall  suffer  and  fall 
a  victim  of  its  own  misdirected  shrewdness. 
Plenty  is  prone  to  early  produce  physical  in- 
dolence, the  poison-breeder  of  the  body,  and  idle- 
ness, which  develops  into  a  practical  inertia — 
idleness,  the  arch  enemy  of  strength,  the  incubator 
of  disease,  the  destroyer  of  character.  Idleness 
early  assumes  the  form  of  fatigue — the  fatigue 
which  excuses  from  duty,  and  shifts  responsibility 
and  effort  upon  others,  and  which  will  certainly 
be  followed  by  a  fatigue  which  is  real — the  fatigue 
of  flabbiness,  the  fatigue  of  inability  and  weak- 


102        THE  MASTERY  OP  NERVOUSNESS 

ness.  Content  may  be  associated  with  such  worth- 
less living,  happiness  never.  Happiness  pines 
and  dies  when  separated  from  effort.  Some  ex- 
cellent intellects,  active  and  not  lacking  in 
progressiveness,  abide  in  lazy  bodies.  But  mental 
indolence  is  probably  more  common  than  physical 
— the  indolence  which  procrastinates,  which  neg- 
lects to  plan  and  arrange,  and  avoids  the  efforts 
attendant  upon  responsibility;  which  shirks  from 
decision  and  the  demands  of  resolution ;  the  mental 
indolence  which  plays  at  work  or  is  content  with 
sham  work — such  mental  indolence  as  makes  pos- 
sible habits  of  inaccuracy,  slovenly  and  superficial 
thinking.  And  fatigue  is  offered  as  the  excuse, 
while  inefficient,  disorganising  worry  attends. 

Many  workers  with  natural  skill  and  cleverness 
have  not  taught  themselves  methodical  habits  of 
thought  in  their  daily  work,  through  months  of 
systematic  routine,  of  earnest,  attentive,  self- 
forgetful  probation;  so  skill  is  discounted  and 
ability  cheapened.  Partial  success  or  failure 
mars  the  usefulness  of  many  who  would  otherwise 
have  attained  an  appreciated  proficiency,  and 
whose  worth  and  skill  and  masterful  superiority 
would  lift  life's  work  above  the  thought  of  ten- 
sion. But  dissatisfaction  and  the  sense  of 
drudgery,  the  weariness  of  wasteful  energy  leak- 
age, the  products  of  disorder  and  confusion,  and 
sense  of  incompetence,  make  work  a  burden  to 
multitudes.  And  so  mind  and  body  deteriorate 
under  the  withering  touch  of  indolence. 

The  damage  of  overwork  is  far  less  common 
than  that  of  underwork.  Few  suffer  nervously 


WORK  103 

who  do  not  use  overwork  as  an  excuse,  and  in  most 
cases,  seriously  and  honestly.  The  factory 
drudge  may  blight  and  weaken  and  fail,  but  the 
damage  is  rarely  from  the  physical  effort  alone. 
It  is  usually  a  combination  of  defective  ventila- 
tion and  imperfect  food — food  more  frequently 
lacking  in  adaptation  to  the  needs  of  the  worker 
than  in  quantity — or  the  result  of  the  erosion  of 
some  infection  undermining  strength ;  or  the  dis- 
integrating influence  of  some  burden  of  anxiety 
or  enmity  weighing  down  the  heart.  There  are 
unquestionably  many  who  do  not  truly  live;  be- 
cause of  man's  cruelty  to  man,  of  their  own  neg- 
lect of  the  higher  life,  the  poisoning  of  the  well- 
springs  of  the  better  nature,  they  merely  drag  out 
an  existence.  To  such  unfortunates,  nervous  ill- 
health  may  come,  but  rarely  as  the  result  of 
overwork.  A  devoted  mother,  slaving  year  after 
year,  denied  the  inspiration  of  love  or  the  heal- 
ing touch  of  kindly  sympathy,  falls  by  the  way- 
side, a  "victim  of  overwork. "  She  was  more 
probably  starved  through  lack  of  wholesome  food 
and  absence  of  pleasure ;  or  faint  because  deprived 
of  the  waters  of  happiness.  Close  observation 
brings  conviction  that  the  great  majority  claim- 
ing overwork  as  the  reason  for  their  nervous  de- 
ficiencies are  victims,  not  of  earnest,  honest, 
productive  work  itself,  but  of  defective  methods 
of  work,  of  work  discounted  by  haste,  stress  and 
strain,  by  impatience,  worry  and  fear.  The  one 
who  has  acquired  proficiency  and  accuracy,  who 
knows  no  methods  but  those  of  earnest  endeavour, 
who  has  learned  to  love  his  work,  which  he  can 


104       THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

only  do  when  that  work  is  a  consecrated  thing — 
for  such  a  worker  nervous  disaster  is  unknown, 
save  when  the  very  superiority  of  his  splendid 
attitude  surrenders  to  the  damaging  intoxications 
of  ill-advised  or  ignorant  eating. 

No  single  factor  plays  so  prominent  a  part  in 
the  blessing  or  damage  of  work,  physical  or  men- 
tal, as  the  associated  feelings.  The  emotional 
life  is  intimately  related  to  nervous  well-being  or 
deficiency.  There  is  no  leakage  of  nervous  force 
comparable  to  that  from  unworthy  and  harmful 
emotions.  Many  workers  who  would  otherwise  be 
efficient,  successful  and  able  to  serve  their  day  and 
generation  happily  year  after  year,  are  regularly 
laid  up  for  repairs  because  of  the  wasteful  emo- 
tional intensity  associated  with  their  activities. 
Some  of  them  take  themselves  and  their  duties 
quite  too  seriously.  They  carry  a  useless,  wasteful 
burden  of  anxiety  to  each  day's  labour,  and  return 
home  bearing  an  even  heavier  load.  Others  de- 
stroy all  possibility  of  happiness  and  content  with 
fear — fear  of  failure,  fear  of  criticism,  fear  of 
being  supplanted,  fear  of  illness  or  loss  of  ability. 
Others  are  ever  robbing  their  strength  and 
resistance  through  impatience  and  overanxiety 
for  promotion,  and  envy  of  superiors.  Calmness, 
stability,  poise,  have  not  been  attained,  and  energy 
leaks,  and  strength  wastes.  Still  others  are  un- 
fitted for  what  they  are  doing — square  pegs  in 
round  holes — and  are  unwilling  to  acknowledge 
their  incompetence  and  to  accept  simpler  positions 
which  they  could  fill  with  efficiency,  and  from 
which  they  might  gain  real  development.  Enthu- 


WORK  105 

siasm,  interest  and  force  and  energy  are  all 
demanded  by  life's  duties  and  responsibilities; 
but  enervating  intensity  and  high  pressure  lead 
to  failure  in  the  mastery  of  life.  And  so  an  early 
lesson  for  those  possessing  the  splendid  possi- 
bilities of  the  highly  organised  nervous  type  is 
to  associate  the  wholesome  emotions  with  effort, 
and  to  daily  strive  for  that  underintensity  which 
is  manifested  through  a  calm,  genial,  kindly  spirit. 

Many  discount  efficiency  and  bring  upon  them- 
selves merited  nervous  instability  because  they 
have  never  risen  superior  to  the  sense  of  discom- 
fort. Few  have  attained  that  attitude  which  takes 
away  from  work  and  daily  duties  those  weakening 
influences  growing  out  of  the  multiplied  irrita- 
tions of  small  discomforts.  Sensitive,  weak  na- 
tures ever  surrender  to  the  constantly  recurring 
but  insignificant  irritations  coincident  with  all 
effort.  Things  are  perverse ;  men  and  women  are 
obstinate;  the  weather  obdurate;  the  market 
fickle ;  the  taxes  inevitable ;  noise  and  activity  and 
turmoil  inseparable  from  progress.  Moodiness, 
misunderstanding,  selfishness,  even  injustice,  are 
human,  and  will  be  brought  to  the  surface  by  the 
knocks  and  jolts  of  life's  contacts.  But  for  him 
who  wishes  to  make  every  day  count  for  ultimate 
success,  who  considers  his  work,  humble  though 
it  may  be,  his  divinely  directed  duty,  these  are 
all  but  incidents,  and  in  rising  above  them  he  is 
discovering  one  of  life's  great  secrets  of  success. 

Oversensitiveness  is  an  almost  universal  leak- 
age defect  among  nervous  workers.  All  effort  is 
accompanied  by  either  a  sense  of  pleasure  or  dis- 


106        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

comfort.  It  is  instinctive  for  the  nervous  to  avoid 
the  uncomfortable,  but  most  nervous  families  keep 
the  attention  of  their  members  focussed  upon 
that  which  is  unpleasant  through  constant  refer- 
ence to  life's  ever-recurring  discomforts.  Such 
habits  merely  increase  the  capacity  for  sensitive- 
ness and  multiply  the  objects  which  harm.  In 
reorganising  one's  nervous  habits  few  forms  of 
effort  are  more  profitable  than  those  directed 
toward  the  overcoming  of  petty  annoyances.  To 
repress  the  irritability  at  interruptions  was  at 
first  difficult,  for  instance,  and  yet  that  very  irrit- 
ability was  more  of  an  energy  leak  and  loss  to 
productiveness  than  was  the  interruption.  Inter- 
ruptions are  inevitable,  but  a  little  training  will 
make  it  possible  for  the  busiest  worker  to  meet 
the  apparently  unreasonable  with  poise  and 
patience. 

Work's  Contribution  to  Mastery. — From  the 
principles  which  have  been  developed  in  earlier 
chapters,  it  seems  that,  keen  as  are  man's  wits, 
shrewd,  penetrating  and  masterful  as  he  has  been 
in  his  contentions  with  Nature,  he  has  not  altered 
one  jot  the  power  of  her  fundamental  laws  over 
his  own  health  and  well-being.  To  outgeneral 
Nature,  by  avoiding  the  duty  of  physical  effort, 
has  been  the  ground  upon  which  man  has  met 
defeat  generation  after  generation.  The  fulness 
of  wisdom  has  not  come  to  any  man  until  he  has 
realised  the  futility  of  trying  to  dodge  his  duty 
to  his  physical  self,  and  of  cheerfully  accepting 
his  share  of  the  world's  work.  In  the  individual 
and  in  the  race,  no  single  factor  can  contribute 


WORK  107 

so  resistlessly  to  mastery  as  work.  When  the 
nervous  sufferer  places  himself  in  the  hands  of 
the  specialist  to-day,  suffering,  as  he  says,  from 
"  overwork, "  he  is  quite  disconcerted  to  be  shown 
that  it  was  not  his  work  but  his  poor  methods 
of  work  that  did  the  harm ;  that  his  prospects  of 
recovery  must  be  based  largely  upon  his  ability 
to  learn  to  work  without  friction  and  worry ;  and 
that  he  must  find  strength  through  the  influence 
of  a  simple,  wholesome  routine  of  active  physical 
effort,  containing  logically  some  of  the  element  of 
drudgery.  Under  the  influence  of  patient  indus- 
try, a  wise  adjustment  of  diet,  and  the  stopping 
of  all  drugs  which  soothe  and  relieve — under  this 
simple,  natural,  almost  primitive  routine,  strength 
returns,  confidence  grows,  nerves  again  become 
servants  and  no  longer  masters,  and  calm  replaces 
the  riot  of  intensity. 

There  is  an  ignorant  aristocracy  ashamed  to 
work,  ashamed  to  blunt  the  pointed  nails,  to  har- 
den the  palms  and  with  them  the  muscles,  to 
darken  cheek,  neck  and  arms  by  mixing  Nature's 
iron  in  the  blood;  who  protect  their  soft  bodies 
as  they  would  the  family  jewels,  but  who  are  not 
ashamed  to  dope,  whine  and  complain,  and  drug 
and  loaf  and  laze.  Slipping  along  the  paths  of 
least  resistance,  many  of  these  weaklings  can  be 
rescued  only  by  resolute  intervention  of  family 
or  friends,  with  authority  to  compel  them  to  profit 
by  the  therapy  of  work.  Many  hysterics  and 
neurasthenics,  the  nervous  of  various  types  and 
classes  and  degrees,  are  to-day  finding  through 
the  education  of  simple  work  ah  adjustment  to 


108        THE  MASTEBY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

life's  demands,  which  means  for  them  comfort 
first,  then  increasing  strength,  and  later  happy 
productiveness.  All  except  the  hopelessly 
maimed,  deformed  or  seriously  diseased,  organi- 
cally, can  improve  health  and  profitably  add  to 
strength  through  regular  daily  exercise. 

All  who  would  have  their  lives  enriched  may 
find  development  of  strength,  reserve  and  an 
augmentation  of  efficiency,  with  a  definite  and  sat- 
isfying sense  of  well-being,  growing  out  of  earnest, 
special,  daily  homage  to  their  muscles.  Man's 
health  is  closely  related  to  the  strength  of  his 
vital  organs,  many  of  which  depend  upon  the 
action  of  involuntary  muscles  for  their  perfect 
function.  There  is  no  direct  method  of  adding 
power  to  these  muscles,  but  it  is  significant  that 
deficient  voluntary  muscles  are  usually  associated 
with  weak  involuntary  muscles.  In  consistent, 
regulated,  voluntary  effort  alone  may  the  involun- 
tary muscles  be  definitely  strengthened.  A  gen- 
eration ago  weak  hearts  were  protected  as  the 
rare  tropical  plant  from  the  frost  of  winter. 
To-day  through  graduated,  intelligent  muscular 
exercise,  organically  disordered  hearts  may  be 
invigorated  and  enabled  to  approximate  the  work 
of  the  normal  heart  through  many  years.  Weak 
hearts  can  now  be  so  certainly  strengthened  that 
even  the  joys  of  mountain  climbing  may  be  under- 
taken without  damage.  Eelaxed  stomachs  and 
other  prolapsed  organs  may  in  many  cases  be 
slowly  but  surely  restored  to  a  vigour  and  tone, 
which  would  almost  belie  their  former  abnormal 
condition,  through  the  exercise  that  builds,  the 


WORK  109 

work  that  strengthens  and  the  effort  that  con- 
structs. Something  is  the  matter  physically  or 
nervously  with  the  average  man  and  woman. 
Few  have  not  some  aches  or  pains  or  complaints. 
The  minority  speak  comfortably  of  their  health; 
and  the  man  or  woman  who  knows  that  buoyancy 
of  health  and  strength  which  makes  effort  a  joy, 
which  places  a  premium  upon  activity — the  health 
which  is  fairly  contagious — is  so  rare  as  to  be 
noteworthy.  Yet  that  health  is  not  impossible, 
through  rational  living,  for  the  majority  of  those 
who  to-day  complain  of  their  inefficiency. 

One  of  the  unfortunate  tendencies  of  the  mod- 
ern medical  and  nursing  care,  and  one  which 
meets  with  ready  acceptance  by  the  average  pa- 
tient, is  that  of  overproduction  and  under-exercise. 
Such  care  has  too  commonly  become  the  rule  for 
those  who  are  suffering  physical  or  nervous  dis- 
orders. For  many  of  them,  the  price  of  health, 
and  for  most,  the  price  of  unusual  health  or  spe- 
cial strength,  is  found  only  in  unusual  effort. 
Many  leading  sedentary  lives  find  much  weariness 
in  their  work,  and  are  quick  to  state  that  in  the 
walking  they  do  about  the  house,  at  the  store  or 
going  to  and  from  the  office,  they  have  reached 
the  physical  limit.  These  are  again  common 
examples  of  the  weariness  of  under-development, 
of  the  tired  feeling  which  is  the  result  of  weak- 
ness; and  few  of  these  weary  ones  but  would 
respond  rapidly  to  the  uplift  and  rejuvenation 
always  waiting  such  underused  bodies  by  aggres- 
sive, muscle-building  effort. 

Most  higher  type  men  and  women  have  a  high 


110        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

regard  for  their  wills,  indeed  are  proud  of  their 
wills.  There  is  but  one  true  witness  of  the  will, 
one  witness  whose  testimony  cannot  be  discredited 
— the  witness  of  action.  It  is  not  what  one  deter- 
mines, what  one  resolves,  but  what  one  produces, 
that  testifies  to  the  will's  strength  and  integrity. 
From  the  nervous  and  often  from  those  who  do 
not  belong  to  this  type  is  heard  a  constant  wail 
of  weariness.  "Oh,  I  don't  want  to;  I  am  too 
tired, "  is  the  reiterated,  deadening  reply  to  the 
request  for  extra  effort.  The  majority  of  the 
nervous  feel  close  to  their  fatigue  limit  at  the 
end  of  each  day's  work.  But  the  nervously  weak 
find  valuable  help  in  the  realisation  that  all  not 
organically  diseased,  or  upon  whose  arteries  the 
hardening  hand  of  age  has  not  been  laid,  may 
increase  their  strength-reserve  and  raise  their 
fatigue-limit  manyfold.  No  part  of  the  body 
is  so  quickly  responsive  to  helpful  effort  as 
the  voluntary  muscular  system.  Within  a  few 
weeks  the  emaciated  typhoid  patient  is  often  the 
picture  of  health,  his  wasted  muscles  restored, 
and  his  weight  as  good  as,  or  better  than,  before 
his  severe  illness.  If  with  confidence  and  deter- 
mination the  undernourished,  feeble-muscled  vic- 
tim of  quick  fatigue  will  undertake  a  course  of 
training  demanding  gradually  increasing  daily 
muscular  effort,  despite  the  acute  weariness  and 
the  discouragingly  sore  muscles  of  the  first  few 
days,  before  the  weeks  have  multiplied,  a  sense 
of  increasing  strength  will  come  as  a  reward  of 
effort.  A  year  of  such  effort  will  change  weak- 


WORK  111 

ness  into  effectiveness;  ten  years  of  rational 
muscular  living  means  robustness ;  and  a  genera- 
tion lived  a  conscientious  daily  muscular  doing 
insures  a  physique  of  iron  and  a  constitution 
inured  to  most  human  ills. 

In  attaining  mastery  through  work,  one  of  the 
blessings  which  increases  hand  in  hand  with  hon- 
est industry,  is  the  disappearance  of  introspection, 
that  common  enemy  to  the  peace  and  tranquillity 
of  a  sensitive  nature.  Devotion  to  duty  leads  the 
mind  away  from  itself  and  its  tenement.  Through 
work  the  power  of  externalisation  grows,  and  in 
this,  man  finds  one  of  the  most  certain  forms  of 
mental  and  spiritual  mastery. 

It  is  a  profound  misfortune  for  any  young  per- 
son to  enter  the  serious  years  of  life  without  hav- 
ing been  earnestly  impressed  with  the  dignity  of 
work,  or  taught  to  feel  that  ever  within  reach  are 
divinely-appointed  duties.  Only  in  seeking  and 
finding  and  doing  the  daily  task,  will  we  pay  the 
price  for  health,  the  price  so  frequently  resented 
or  denied.  Here  will  we  find  as  well  the  nucleus 
of  contentment,  the  heart  of  truth  and  the  laugh 
of  happiness.  Let  not  the  artistic,  the  exalted, 
the  brilliant  and  the  aristocratic  forget  the  call 
of  drudgery.  A  touch  of  it  regularly  for  us  all 
is  the  touch  that  keeps  our  hearts  and  minds  akin 
to  the  great  working  mass  of  mankind  and  woman- 
kind. In  our  bit  of  drudgery,  or  in  our  life  of 
drudgery,  let  us  not  make  the  fatal  mistake  of 
discrediting  what  we  do,  but  develop  the  delight 
in  doing  and  persistently  dodge  the  lazing.  So 


112        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

with  pride  and  the  spirit  of  competition,  even 
though  self  be  the  sole  opponent,  the  most  menial 
tasks  may  be  exalted. 


CHAPTER  X 
PLAY 

The  Fine  Art  of  Play. — Work  may  be  defined  as 
consistent,  productive  action,  and  play  as  pleasur- 
able action.  Mother  Nature  plays  with  us 
patiently  and  beautifully  as  children.  Unless  we 
have  been  spoiled  by  our  purse-proud  or  fright- 
ened elders,  we  early  learn  the  beauties  inherent 
in  sticks  and  mud  and  stones,  and  pieces  of  broken 
china,  and  chicken  feathers  and  unbathable  rag 
dolls,  and  romping  and  running  and  tumbling, 
and  disobeying  and  switchings,  and  lusty  howling 
and  shouts  of  glee,  because  we  are  living  in  the 
play-day  of  life,  and  our  tears  serve  but  to  make 
the  rainbows;  for  nothing  serious  or  tragic  or 
impending  exists.  But  all  this  fulness  of  health 
and  lustiness  and  normality  and  joy  are  apt  to 
slip  away  as  the  realities  of  life  crowd  in.  The 
unfortunate  early  abandons  all  play;  the  dignity 
of  maturity,  the  dictates  of  our  neighbour's  set, 
the  inertia  of  indolence,  the  love  of  ease,  gradually 
descend  upon  us.  Most  wholesome  physical  ac- 
tivity which  can  be  called  play  is  lost  to  the 
average  young  person  by  twenty-one ;  but  we  play 
cards  or  perchance  checkers,  or,  if  a  bit  mentally 
ambitious,  chess;  and  we  dance  ourselves  dizzy 
in  overheated  rooms,  oft  playing  with  fire;  or 

113 


* 


114       THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

twist  up  our  nervous  tension  several  notches  and 
rush  ourselves  through  the  country  with  our 
precious  necks  depending  upon  the  life  of  a  rubber 
tire. 

Society  at  play  has  had  little  that  is  wholesome 
beyond  these  limited  activities,  until  quite  recent 
years.  To-day  in  our  private  schools  and  colleges, 
and  even  in  some  public  schools  and  through 
municipal  playgrounds,  consistent  effort  is  being 
made  to  teach  our  young  people  the  art  of  play. 
But  too  many  men  and  women  have  never  learned 
this  art  since  it  slipped  with  the  ebbing  of  child- 
hood ;  and  with  the  need  of  play  not  second  to  that 
of  work,  are  unable  to  enter  into  this  God-given 
ability  with  any  semblance  of  success.  Awkward, 
self-conscious,  uninterested,  the  average  grown-up 
to-day  makes  work  of  his  play.  He  finds  in  the 
weather,  and  his  cold,  and  the  extra  hour's  work 
at  the  office,  in  unnecessary  and  unimportant 
engagements,  ample  opportunity  and  excuse  for 
avoiding  his  hours  in  the  open.  He  was  not  made 
for  indoor  life.  Pneumonia  and  tuberculosis  and 
dyspepsia  and  nervousness  combine  to  send  him 
afoot  and  afield.  Most  emphatically  do  they  urge 
him  to  "up  and  out  and  go."  But  there  is  so 
little  for  him  to  do  when  he  leaves  his  work-bench 
or  his  library.  To  be  nervously  efficient,  to  be 
nervously  self -mastered  and  dependable,  one  must 
learn  to  make  play  of  play.  While  ten  thousand 
forms  of  effort  have  been  called  work,  it  is  signi- 
ficant how  few  of  man's  activities  he  calls  play. 

But  there  is  always  the  out-of-doors,  and  even 
a  walk  through  the  monotonous  city  street  is 


PLAY  115 

better  than  the  sluggish  sleepy-hollow  chair. 
Walking,  to  be  worth  while  as  a  sport,  should 
take  us  afield,  and  if  it  is  the  only  exercise  de- 
pended upon  for  extra  health  and  endurance,  it 
must  be  pushed  in  activity  and  distance  to  be 
effective.  At  least  six  miles  in  an  hour  and  a 
half  for  the  normal  man,  and  four  miles  in  eighty 
minutes  for  the  average  woman,  is  a  mild 
minimum.  Our  ruddy-cheeked  English  cousins 
consider  double  this  amount  a  fair  daily  average. 
Tramping  is  splendid.  Eoughly  clad,  independent 
of  rain  and  snow,  with  a  light  pack,  a  tramping 
tour  lasting  five  or  six  days  and  covering  a  hun- 
dred miles,  sleeping  in  the  open  if  at  all  practical, 
is  a  contribution  to  health,  strength  and  robust- 
ness not  found  in  a  month's  motoring.  Hill- 
climbing  is  one  of  the  very  best  forms  of  condensed 
exercise.  It  develops  the  heavy  thigh  and  calf 
muscles,  tissues  which  become  literal  secreters  of 
vitality.  And  while  it  may  be  monotonous,  and 
certainly  does  look  a  bit  foolish  to  hike  up  and 
down  the  same  path  repeatedly,  a  thousand  feet 
of  hill-climbing  a  day,  kept  up  month  after 
month,  will  add  famously  to  strength,  breathing 
capacity  and  total  vitality. 

Water  sports,  including  swimming,  rowing, 
canoeing  and  yachting,  with  motor-boating  a 
badly  distanced  substitute,  are  unfortunately  not 
commonly  available.  Swimming  and  canoeing 
are  particularly  productive  of  stamina.  Few  ex- 
periences so  promptly  strip  off  the  veneer  of  over- 
sensitiveness  as  camp  life — not  the  silk-stocking 
kind,  with  a  motor-car  at  your  elbow  and  generous 


116        THE  MASTEBY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

hampers  of  rich  delicacies,  and  inexhaustible 
flasks  of  icy-hot,  with  tents  and  air-mattresses  and 
all  the  comforts  of  home;  but  a  genuine  spell 
of  roughing  it,  doing  your  own  cooking,  dish- 
washing and  laundering,  rolling  up  in  your 
blanket  with  a  few  fresh  boughs  for  a  bed,  and 
learning  to  sleep  with  the  heavens  as  your  canopy 
and  the  slowly-trooping  stars  as  your  watchers. 
How  quickly  the  slavery  of  comfort  can  thus 
be  eliminated.  The  scratches  and  temporary  ab- 
sences of  skin  become  insignificant,  and  we  forget 
to  jump  and  exclaim  at  contact  with  the  harmless 
things  that  creep  and  crawl.  How  soon  we  find 
ourselves  akin  to  Nature,  who  would  love  us  into 
worthy  manhood  and  womanhood,  who  ever  calls 
us  to  snuggle  close  to  her  ample  bosom  and  renew 
our  strength,  as  did  the  giant  of  old!  How 
promptly  our  good  Mother  Nature  fulfils  her 
promises  and  shares  with  us  her  own  imperturb- 
able serenity,  if  we  but  answer  her  call !  But  the 
flowers,  the  grasses,  the  trees  and  the  birds,  the 
beauty  of  hill  and  vale,  the  thrill  of  mountain- 
side, the  wild,  picturesque  song  of  its  dashing 
stream,  are  insufficient  to  satisfy  the  needs  of 
many  who  would  seek  the  open  for  restoration. 
So  hunting  and  fishing  give  an  added  interest  of 
chase  and  contest  to  the  call  of  the  open,  and  have 
proven  restorative  forces  for  many  who  have  felt 
the  frazzle  of  misuse. 

Our  out-of-door  games  are  limited.  Golf  is 
helping  much.  A  set  of  aggressive  tennis  each 
week  day  will  furnish  all  the  special  needs  of  the 
average  man  or  woman.  Tennis  requires  skill 


PLAY  117 

and  many  months  of  practice  before  a  satisfactory 
game  can  be  played.  Baseball  is  one  of  the  most 
perfect  games  from  the  spectators'  standpoint, 
but  as  it  requires  a  large  field  and  but  few  players, 
the  number  who  can  derive  direct  benefit  from 
this  excellent  exercise  is  limited.  Basket-ball  in 
the  open  is  practicable  but  a  few  months  of  the 
year.  It  is  a  strenuous,  active,  helpful  game  for 
those  who  are  physically  fit.  This  short  list 
practically  comprises  the  wholesome  forms  of 
out-of-door  play  available  to-day,  and  where  one 
can  profit  by  some  of  these,  ten  cannot.  When 
it  comes  to  suggesting  play  for  the  average  man 
and  woman  whose  physical  strength  and  nervous 
comfort  are  hanging  in  the  balance,  the  inade- 
quacy of  our  generation's  play-life  for  grown-ups 
is  made  pitiably  evident.  But  the  insistence  upon 
daily  exercise  has  been  reiterated  with  an  em- 
phasis which  cannot  be  denied,  if  the  principles 
upon  which  the  arguments  are  based  are  accepted. 
To  plan  home  exercise  is  very  simple.  To  plan 
home  exercise  which  can  be  considered  as  play 
is  extremely  difficult.  For  all  who  would  maintain 
health,  the  day  should  begin  with  three  or  four 
minutes  of  active  breathing  exercises,  the  soldier's 
position  of  attention  being  assumed,  with  chin  and 
shoulders  drawn  back,  and  the  lungs  repeatedly 
filled  to  capacity  with  the  freshest  and  purest  air 
obtainable.  If  this  becomes  a  life's  habit,  the 
greatest  possible  benefit  to  lungs  and  circulation 
will  result.  A  harmless  feeling  of  dizziness  from 
oxygen  intoxication  is  quite  common  when  this 
exercise  is  first  being  attempted.  Eaising  the 


118        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

body  repeatedly  to  full  height  on  the  toes  until 
the  calves  feel  the  stab  of  acute  tire,  and  following 
this  with  the  spread-eagle — that  excellent  inten- 
sive exercise  of  the  army  setting-up  drill — pushed 
to  comparative  breathlessness,  with  active  and 
thorough  bending  of  the  trunk,  will  provide  in 
ten  minutes  of  vigorous  work  a  daily  home  exer- 
cise which  in  the  course  of  years  will  prove  an 
irrefutable  contribution  to  health.  He  who  is 
truly  in  earnest  and  has  no  hill  to  climb  will  find 
in  the  stairs  a  prosaic  but  efficient  substitute. 
For  the  reasonably  strong,  a  few  trips  up  daily, 
two  steps  at  a  time,  and  later  possibly  three  steps 
at  a  jump,  so  increased  as  to  insure  thorough 
deep  breathing  and  a  sense  of  acute  tire,  is  an 
energetic  and  developing  method  of  exercise  open 
to  all  not  organically  diseased.  When  a  com- 
panion is  available,  fifteen  minutes 9  use  of  a  f our- 
or  six-pound  medicine-ball  is  probably  the  most 
simply  useful  of  all  home  exercises.  Best  taken 
out-of-doors,  if  possible,  otherwise  in  a  well- 
ventilated  room,  this  exercise  is  very  useful  for 
the  development  of  the  important  chest  and  back 
muscles,  when  the  ball  is  actively  thrown.  When 
four  or  five  can  exercise  together,  a  simple  real 
sport,  with  rapid  education  of  muscle  and  delicacy 
of  movement,  is  possible  in  the  passing  of  a  medi- 
cine-ball, basket-ball,  baseball  and  tennis-ball  in 
rapid  succession.  Not  a  little  skill  is  required  in 
keeping  these  spheres  of  various  sizes  and  weights 
in  rapid  rotation,  and  much  sport  is  possible. 
Many  other  useful  forms  of  ten  or  fifteen  minute 
home  exercises  have  been  devised.  Also  many 


PLAY  119 

fake  systems  of  physical  culture  are  available  for 
those  who  would  part  with  their  dollars.  But  it 
is  not  the  high-priced  system,  not  the  elaborate 
appliances,  but  the  faithful  following  of  a  simple 
routine,  systematically  and  persistently,  which 
brings  the  desired  health  and  the  strength  and 
vitality  which  are  the  basis  of  physical  vivacity, 
productiveness  and  resistance.  Exercises  spe- 
cially planned  for  health  are  so  lacking  in  the  play 
element  that  many  of  the  above  suggestions  are 
given  with  full  recognition  of  the  large  amount 
of  moral  courage  necessary  to  successfully  carry 
them  out. 

The  gymnasium  always  offers  the  incentive  of 
class  work  under  the  skilled  director.  Two  or 
three  years  of  earnest  gymnasium  training  is  a 
splendid  addition  to  the  education  of  boys  and 
girls  of  twelve  to  fifteen.  Boxing  and  wrestling 
are  more  violent  exercises,  which  develop  strength 
rapidly,  and  are  capable  of  producing  a  large 
return  in  benefit  for  those  sufficiently  strong  to 
make  use  of  them.  There  is  a  form  of  hand- 
wrestling  which  can  be  carried  out  by  any  two 
of  reasonably  balanced  strength,  capable  of  bene- 
ficially utilising  all  the  muscles  of  the  body,  and 
developing  agility  and  poise  as  well  as  strength. 

For  all  who  are  seeking  nervous  restoration 
through  the  efficiency  of  diet  and  exercise,  the 
question  comes  as  to  how  much  exercise  should 
be  taken.  The  average  nervous  sufferer  will  begin 
his  restitution  in  poor  physical  condition.  If  at 
all  possible,  several  weeks  should  be  devoted  to 
a  camping  or  tramping  trip,  or  to  some  course  of 


120        THE  MASTERY  OP  NERVOUSNESS 

systematic  physical  culture,  or  several  hours  a 
day  spent  in  gradually  increasing  miles  of  walk- 
ing, with  any  form  of  work  with  the  hands  which 
will  strengthen  the  muscles.  Wood-chopping, 
gardening,  spading,  transplanting,  work  on  the 
farm,  or  other  physical  work,  can  be  gradually 
and  steadily  increased  until  the  fatigue  limit  has 
been  pushed  far  beyond  that  of  the  past.  After 
one  has  truly  conditioned  himself  through  such 
means,  one-half  hour  of  the  more  active  indoor 
exercises  in  addition  to  energetic  daily  walking 
pushed  to  the  point  of  perspiration,  will  usually 
suffice  to  maintain  a  high  degree  of  health  and 
strength  through  many  years. 

The  fine  art  of  play  does  not  require  the  com- 
petition of  contest,  the  rivalry  of  athletic  conflict 
or  the  stimulus  of  applause,  but  is  an  art  which 
lends  itself  to  all  action.  We  have  seen  that  both 
work  and  play  are  forms  of  activity.  The  world 
has  for  many  generations  spoken  of  its  work 
with  more  or  less  anguish  and  resentment,  and  is 
ever  looking  away  from  work  to  the  days  of  play. 
But  the  world  does  not  know  the  fine  art  of  play. 
We  have  not  realised  that  the  great  difference 
between  work  and  play  is  but  a  difference  of  atti- 
tude. Those  actions  which  we  choose,  and  in 
which  there  is  no  compulsion  save  the  desires  of 
our  own  sweet  wills,  and  which  are  performed 
purely  from  the  love  of  the  action  therein,  are 
called  play.  The  same  action  instantly  becomes 
work  when  done  under  coercion.  The  most  en- 
thusiastic football  half-back  would  soon  loathe 
his  plunging  line-bucking  were  he  opposed  by 


PLAY  121 

wooden  dummies,  were  he  compelled  to  bruise  and 
strain  to  overcome  mere  mechanical  resistance, 
were  his  sport  robbed  of  the  keen  spirit  of  com- 
petition and  the  thrill  of  the  personal  encounter. 
The  fine  art  of  play  recognises  in  all  activity  the 
opportunity  for  pleasure.  The  weakling  makes 
work  of  his  play,  and  is  joyless  in  the  very  pursuit 
of  his  sport.  The  great  mass  of  the  world's 
workers  think  of  work  as  work.  A  small  com- 
pany of  grown-ups  have  retained  their  ability  to 
play,  and  to  look  on  play  as  play.  He  has  ad- 
justed self  to  life,  he  has  applied  a  wholesome 
philosophy  to  his  earthly  span  of  existence,  who 
enters  into  all  the  activities  of  so-called  work 
with  the  fine  spirit  of  play;  who,  finding  joy  in 
the  doing,  puts  the  enthusiasm  and  the  spirit  into 
his  work  that  makes  him  an  inspiration  to  all 
who  feel  his  mastery  of  the  great  secret  which 
life  gives  us  all  to  solve.  For  him  idealism  finds 
expression  in  what  his  hands  and  his  mind  find 
to  do. 

He  is  above  all  the  true  sportsman  who  recog- 
nises within  himself  a  power  which  transmutes 
the  weariness  of  drudgery.  To  him  consistent 
and  productive  activities  of  mind  and  body  are 
part  of  that  great  game  of  life  in  which  Destiny 
deals  the  cards  and  man  names  the  trump.  The 
master-man  is  a  true  sportsman,  and  is  as  sensi- 
tive to  the  moral  element  of  his  play-work  or  his 
work-play  as  to  any  duty  to  his  neighbour  or  his 
God;  and  in  work  and  play,  in  the  game  of  life 
or  in  his  game  of  golf,  he  keeps  spite  and  selfish- 
ness out  of  the  competition,  and  puts  pride  and 


122        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

honour  in.  To  him  who  will  earnestly  study  the 
rules  of  life's  game  and  play  it  fair — fair  to  him- 
self and  fair  to  those  who  need  his  strength — 
the  mastery  will  come  when  work  is  no  longer 
drudgery  but  has  taken  on  the  spirit  of  play ;  and 
when  the  ideals  of  sincerity,  honour  and  integrity, 
inherent  in  sportsmanship,  come,  he  then  is  able 
to  play  the  game  as  a  victor,  and  none  of  the 
enemies  of  life's  happiness  or  of  joy  will  over- 
take him  in  the  race  for  the  goal,  in  the  race  for 
the  great  goal  of  self-mastery,  for  the  attainment 
of  which  the  game  of  life  is  played. 


CHAPTER  XI 
TANGLED  THOUGHTS 

The  Mind's  Omnipotence. — From  the  foregoing 
discussion  of  the  physical  causes  producing  nerv- 
ousness it  appears  that  the  physical  habits  of  the 
majority  to-day  invite  nervous  disorder.  It  is 
true  that  examination  of  many  of  the  nervous 
seeking  professional  counsel  reveals  bodily  dis- 
turbances, chiefly  disorders  which  spring  from 
errors  in  eating  or  neglect  of  exercise.  We  have 
learned  moreover,  that  practically  all  the  nervous 
are  distinctly  benefited  by  a  wise  attention  to 
nutritional  harmony.  But  nervousness  can  exist 
in  the  apparently  sound  body,  the  body  in  which 
the  skilled  examiner  fails  to  find  organic  or  chem- 
ical defect.  Indeed,  most  victims  of  nerves  re- 
quire a  mental  readjustment,  as  earnest  and  far- 
reaching  as  the  physical.  In  fact,  the  commonest 
of  the  mental  causes  of  nervousness  are  so  obvi- 
ous that  certain  schools  of  healers  ignore  the 
physical  basis  entirely,  and  depend  only  upon  the 
mental  readjustment  to  effect  cure.  Such  form 
of  treatment  is  scientifically  termed  psychother- 
apy, meaning  simply  mental  healing.  Through 
the  centuries  numberless  cures  have  been  effected 
through  mental  influence,  which  has  also  afforded 
more  or  less  permanent  relief  from  distressing 

123 


124        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

symptoms  to  many  more.  When  we  recall  our 
conception  of  nervousness,  as  the  undue  response 
of  the  sensitive  nervous  mechanism  to  stimuli, 
such  a  possibility  becomes  at  once  obvious;  for, 
while  we  must  whisper  it  gently  so  as  not  to 
offend  these  same  sensitive  ones,  nervousness  is, 
in  truth,  a  mental  disorder.  The  condition  of 
the  body  normally  contributes  strongly  to  our 
mental  poise,  but  the  brain  may  become  so  slug- 
gish under  the  influence  of  a  powerful  drug  that 
the  mind  will  fail  to  note  even  the  most  intense 
physical  pain.  On  the  other  hand,  under  the 
whip  and  spur  of  its  own  poisons,  the  brain  may 
become  a  true  sensitive-plant,  and  mental  respon- 
siveness to  all  forms  of  stimuli  be  increased  many 
times.  It  becomes  clear,  therefore,  that  the 
mental  basis  of  nervousness  is  a  consciousness 
ill  at  ease,  if  not  acutely  suffering. 

And  what  a  superb  instrument  is  man's  mind! 
We  have  already  noted  its  almost  limitless 
capacity  for  adjustment  and  adaptation.  The 
accumulated  writings  of  the  sensualists,  philoso- 
phic, ethic  and  esthetic,  have  failed  to  tell  the 
whole  story  of  the  possibilities  and  varieties 
inherent  in  human  sensation.  From  one  point  of 
view,  the  entire  surface  of  the  body  is  an  elaborate 
mechanism  for  acquainting  the  mind  with  a  great 
world  of  things,  and  for  bringing  it,  year  after 
year,  into  closer  touch  with  our  universe.  Words 
have  never  yet  adequately  described  the  fulness 
of  seeing  and  feeling  and  hearing. 

Philosophy  has  it  that  our  morning  paper  and 
far  Polaris,  the  south  wind  against  my  brow,  the 


TANGLED  THOUGHTS  125 

cricket's  friendly  chirp,  the  anguish  of  pain  and 
the  mother's  lullaby,  exist  only  in  individual  per- 
ceptions; and  when  we  consider  how  quickly  the 
few  drops  of  potent  drug  instilled  into  our  veins 
extinguish  these  and  all  other  conscious  relations, 
we  feel  the  force  of  the  philosopher's  insistence. 
But  while  we  accept  this  conception  for  the 
moment,  we  go  on  thinking  and  feeling  and  doing 
and  living  as  though  what  we  saw  and  touched 
existed  outside  of  our  minds;  as  when,  through 
the  mental  faculty  termed  apperception,  we  recog- 
nise the  blotch  of  moving  colour  on  the  hillside 
as  our  child,  the  floating  brown  speck  on  the  dis- 
tant water  as  our  neighbour's  motor-boat,  or  the 
dim  hum  in  the  distance  as  the  auto  of  a  distinct 
make,  our  mind  grasps  these  symbols  as  unques- 
tioned reality,  and  we  know  what  we  have  seen 
and  heard  to  be  so.  How  acutely,  shrewdly,  how 
ingeniously  does  the  mind  travel  to  the  full  limit 
of  the  senses  and  return  with  satisfied  knowledge ! 
With  closed  eyes  and  all  the  curtains  of  the 
senses  drawn,  how  truly  may  Memory  select  one 
from  the  million  threads  which  Experience  has 
spun,  and  follow  it  unerringly  through  its  varie- 
gated course  in  the  intricate  pattern  of  the  past. 
And  how  truly  does  she  reveal,  and  how  clearly 
does  she  again  disclose  each  sober  tone  of  trouble 
or  each  golden  glint  of  gladness !  How  carefully 
she  keeps  each  strand  in  place !  At  any  hour  the 
prosaic  or  poetic  pattern  may  be  reproduced,  as 
she  flashes  the  light  of  the  present  over  the  fabric 
of  the  past,  that  the  worker  may  mistake  not 
where  he  is  in  his  weaving. 


126       THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

Ideation  gives  the  future  to  man  with  its  beau- 
ties, its  warnings,  its  friends  and  its  duties.  In 
the  mind  of  childhood  it  converts  the  simple  and 
the  commonplace,  for  the  time,  into  all  that  heart 
can  desire;  the  imagination  of  youth  builds  its 
castles  towering  to  the  sky — castles  which  will 
never  know  the  reality  of  stone  and  mortar,  but 
castles  in  which  great  hopes,  great  desires,  and 
now  and  again,  great  resolutions,  are  born. 
Imagination  throws  the  halo  of  beauty  over  each 
mother's  girl-child  and  drapes  the  mantle  of  great- 
ness over  the  helpless  shoulders  of  her  man-child. 
Ideation  fills  our  libraries,  paints  our  canvases 
and  delves  into  the  very  mind  of  Nature,  trans- 
muting her  powers  into  the  clicking  looms  and  the 
tireless  wheels  of  industry. 

Upon  the  throne  of  this  mind  sits  Judgment — 
deliberate,  calm,  masterful,  regal — the  mind's 
ruler,  whom  Memory  serves  with  the  faithfulness 
and  readiness  of  Mercury  of  old,  before  whom 
Ideation  lays  all  his  plans  and  dreams,  in  whose 
presence  Emotion's  children  of  mirth  and  joy 
may  sing  and  dance  and  revel,  while  her  daugh- 
ters of  mourning  wipe  away  the  tears  that  blind 
and  ask  for  the  duty  which  leads  to  content. 
Even  imperious  Will  bows  in  homage  to  reason 
and  pledges  the  allegiance  of  his  forces — those 
forces  which  do  the  mind's  great  work,  and  are 
ever  ready  to  protect  it  from  enemies  which  would 
destroy.  The  decisions  of  reason  are  called  judg- 
ments, and,  as  the  decisions  of  the  good  king, 
should  be  the  law  of  the  land. 

We  have  indulged  in  a  fanciful  review  of  the 


TANGLED  THOUGHTS  127 

elements  into  which  the  psychologist  divides  the 
mind,  that  our  memory  might  be  refreshed  and 
our  more  prosaic  and  serious  consideration  of 
those  disorders  which  discount  the  mind's  serenity 
and  cause  it  to  suffer,  might  be  clear.  As  we  have 
seen,  the  mind's  various  qualities  put  us  in  touch 
with  not  only  the  happenings  of  the  present 
moment,  but  with  the  vast  store-houses  of  the 
past  and  the  unlimited,  presumptuous  future;  of 
all  this  each  man  is  a  king  indeed  in  his  unlimited 
freedom  in  selecting  that  upon  which  his  mind 
will  dwell.  In  the  mind  in  which  reason  has  de- 
veloped and  has  assumed  its  intended  mastery, 
overruling  the  demands  and  impulses  of  emotion, 
and  in  which  will  is  responsive  and  responsible, 
the  ability  to  select,  to  elect  those  objects  to  which 
it  will  give  attention,  is  practically  absolute.  In 
the  selection  of  its  objects  of  attention,  the  normal 
mind  is  omnipotent.  The  construction  of  such  a 
mind  is  not  unlike  that  of  a  vast  telephone  ex- 
change, with  switchboards,  into  which  run  myriad 
wires,  any  one  of  which  the  mind  of  the  operator 
can  select,  and,  oblivious  to  the  insistence  of  all 
other  lines,  hold  communion  with  the  individual 
of  his  choice.  At  any  moment,  switching  upon 
another  line,  he  can  be  instantly  in  touch  with 
a  new  and  remote  interest.  "Within  a  hand's 
touch  of  a  babel  of  voices,  he  selects  and  attends 
to  one  and  spurns  all  others.  And  so  the  normal 
mind,  through  attention,  concentrates  its  forces 
along  one  line  of  interest,  oblivious  to  the  clam- 
ouring, calling,  crowding,  insisting  world  of  other 
interests.  And  so  we  can  be  a  thousand  Ps  as 


128        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

we  turn  attention  from  one  thrilling  and  com- 
pelling interest  to  another  and  again  another,  for 
the  normal  mind  can  select  well  its  world.  The 
fearsome  law  of  the  mind  is,  that  consciously  or 
unconsciously,  joyously  or  miserably,  it  lives  its 
own  choice,  it  follows  the  path  of  its  own  selection. 

Education  in  its  various  aspects  is  intended  to 
place  before  the  mind  in  proper  order  and  truth- 
ful form  a  gradually  increasing  number  of  objects 
from  which  the  mind  may  choose  and  multiply  its 
ideas,  the  while  it  is  supposed  to  be  increasing  the 
keenness  and  the  accuracy  of  the  critical  sense, 
that  specialised  function  which  makes  possible  a 
high  quality  of  selection.  Advanced  development 
of  this  critical  sense  presupposes  the  possession 
of  a  large  variety  of  facts  from  which  comparisons 
are  possible,  and  a  breadth  of  judgment  which 
withholds  decision  until  all  available  facts  have 
been  considered.  Education  is  no  insurance, 
however,  of  perfection,  or  even  of  a  high  degree 
of  selective  skill.  Common  sense,  Nature's  gift, 
intuitively  chooses  from  the  mass  of  the  mind's 
possibilities  the  helpful  thought,  the  practical  and 
the  appropriate  thought,  and  attends  thereto. 

Tangled  Thoughts. — Few  minds  are  naturally 
or  through  cultivation  so  poised  and  adjusted  as 
to  adapt  themselves  faultlessly  to  the  business 
in  hand.  Even  as  the  physical  habits  of  indolence 
are  acquired  in  childhood,  so  damaging  mental 
habits  are  early  formed.  In  the  midst  of  the 
infinite  variety  of  the  world's  beauties  and  needs 
and  interests,  many  permit  attention  to  lie  dor- 
mant. As  the  child  of  laziness  remains  abed  till 


TANGLED  THOUGHTS  129 

a  late  hour  of  the  day,  so,  many  minds  fail  to 
leave  their  couch  of  narrow  interests,  and  neglect 
year  after  year  earnest  thought  or  serious  mental 
endeavour.  A  very  common  defect  with  certain 
types  of  the  nervous  is  this  one  of  limited  inter- 
ests, and  limited  interests  are  usually  self-in- 
terests. Others  through  lack  of  mental  effort  or 
from  overcrowding  in  their  school  work,  or  as  a 
result  of  imperfect  teaching,  develop  haziness  of 
thought,  with  a  resulting  uncertainty  which  is  in 
itself  a  weakness,  and  a  basis  for  much  of  the 
indecision  so  common  to  the  nervous.  Mental 
habits  form  early,  and  before  twenty  the  average 
mind  has  worn  its  pathways  of  thought — path- 
ways which  are  ever  afterward  ways  of  least 
resistance.  These  thought  habits  formed  uncon- 
sciously in  childhood  and  youth  are  replaced  in 
adult  life  only  by  painstaking  and  consistent 
conscious  effort. 

Most  nervous  suffering  growing  out  of  defective 
thinking  is  the  result  of  error.  Ignorance  is  com- 
mon, and  false  ideas,  errors  in  interpretation,  and 
false  judgments,  afford  constant  opportunity  to 
select  objects  of  thought  and  attention  which  are 
unwholesome  and  harmful.  Until  reason  has 
been  trained  to  control  the  activities  of  the  mind, 
feelings  assert  the  mastery,  and  wants  and  desires 
fly  into  the  foreground,  insistent  and  demanding. 
The  mastery  of  reason  and  the  control  of  the  will 
must  protect  us  from  the  errors  which  grow  out 
of  thoughtless,  impulsive  action.  Childhood  is  a 
period  largely  ruled  by  emotions.  Youth's  tem- 
perament has  strong  desire,  and  reason  seems  for 


130       THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

the  time  hopeless,  while  emotion  holds  the  ascend- 
ency. Many  of  the  nervous  have  failed  to  develop 
beyond  this  stage,  having  never  systematically 
and  resolutely  harkened  to  the  voice  of  Eeason. 
They  have  not  willed,  and  willed  again,  that 
impulse  be  set  aside,  and  that  counsel  and  reason 
be  followed.  Many  at  thirty  or  forty — yes,  at 
fifty  or  sixty — still  maintain  the  emotional  minds 
of  youth,  and  continue  to  suffer  through  false 
judgment.  Many  physically  mature  and  scholas- 
tically  well-trained  men  and  women  confuse  feel- 
ing and  reason.  They  believe  that  they  are 
deliberately  contemplating  a  situation  from  all 
points  of  view,  when  they  are  merely  brooding; 
and  far  from  earnest,  forceful,  logical  thinking, 
they  are  but  emotionally  dreaming  of  greater  ills 
or  brighter  pleasures.  Deceiving  themselves  into 
the  belief  that  they  are  reasoning  the  question 
out,  they  but  drift  from  one  feeling  to  another, 
and  the  conclusions  they  reach  are  little  better 
than  the  choice  of  chance. 

Many  seek  nervous  help  in  the  belief  that 
through  some  unusual  physical  effort  in  the  past 
— a  hard  year  in  the  store,  or  the  care  of  an  invalid 
parent — or  that  from  the  remnants  of  some  acci- 
dent of  long  ago,  a  permanent  physical  hurt  has 
resulted,  and  ascribe  to  such  supposed  injuries  an 
impossible  list  of  aches  and  pains.  The  real 
damage  has  been  far  more  often  one  of  hurtful 
mental  selection,  or  worry  and  anxieties,  of  appre- 
hension, of  the  reiteration  of  harmful  memories — 
memories  which  obscure  the  firmament  of  hope 
and  happiness  with  their  grey  pall  of  depression. 


TANGLED  THOUGHTS  131 

How  many  minds  hang  with  fateful  tenacity  upon 
a  loss — the  mother  for  her  child,  the  husband  for 
the  sainted  wife!  How  frequently  the  recurring 
consciousness  of  a  sin,  or  of  injustice  suffered, 
drapes  the  stage  of  life's  action  with  the  black- 
ness of  mourning,  shutting  out  the  voices  of 
happiness,  blinding  the  eye  to  the  beckoning  of 
hope,  and  fairly  smothering  the  heart's  impulses 
for  good.  Such  memories  are  but  premature 
winding  sheets,  imprisoning  the  nature  which 
should  still  find  loves  and  friendships  and  inspira- 
tion in  this  big,  teeming,  needy  world. 

Superficial  knowledge,  accepted  as  final,  definite 
and  positive,  is  a  soil  in  which  many  weeds  of 
nervousness  grow  luxuriantly.  In  our  study  of 
dietary  errors  we  have  seen  how  little  the  average 
man  knows  of  the  relatively  simple  processes  of 
digestion,  and  he  knows  even  less  of  the  more 
intricate  action  of  organs  more  vital.  But  the 
superficial  thinker  is  satisfied  with  quarter-  or 
half -knowledge.  So  when,  after  an  unwonted  bit 
of  exercise,  he  notes  the  active  pulsations  of  his 
heart  and  finds  that  organ  dutifully  registering 
a  hundred  and  twenty  or  thirty  beats  a  minute, 
he  is  seized  with  a  panic — he  has  "palpitation  of 
the  heart."  From  that  day,  seriously  or  fear- 
somely,  he  avoids  undue  exercise,  and  probably 
falls  into  the  pulse-feeling  habit,  which  may  grow 
until  the  action  of  his  heart  divides  his  attention 
with  all  the  possibilities  of  world-wide  interests, 
a  poor  victim  of  superficial  knowledge.  Yet  he 
represents  a  common  class  of  the  nervous.  Men 
and  women  of  this  type  discount  their  usefulness 


132       THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

many  per  cent,  through  periods  of  years,  simply 
because  they  do  not  know  that  every  normal  heart 
should  beat  a  hundred  and  twenty  or  thirty  times 
a  minute  following  an  unusual  furlong's  run  for 
the  train,  or  any  other  active  and  unaccustomed 
exercise.  Thousands  refuse  to  know  the  moun- 
tain's beatitudes  at  first  hand,  because  of  the 
nervous  sensation  of  air-hunger  common  to  many 
who  are  anxious  and  depressed,  believing  that 
the  moderately  rare  air  of  the  mountain  elevation 
is  pregnant  with  impending  disaster. 

Superficial  knowledge  and  a  persistence  of  emo- 
tional supremacy  over  reason  is  a  basis  for  sug- 
gestibility— a  nervous  defect  fundamental  in  that 
large  class  of  the  nervous,  styled  "  hysterics. " 
In  suggestibility  the  mind  is  influenced  by  feeling, 
even  in  the  face  of  the  protests  of  reason,  but  too 
frequently  reason  is  not  there  to  protest.  Many 
lives  are  practically  crazy  patch-works,  knowing 
neither  persistence  nor  stability,  truly  children  of 
occasion,  impelled  by  suggestions  introduced  by 
emotions,  often  not  even  challenged  by  reason. 
Suggestibility  is  an  essential  asset  of  the  child 
mind.  It  leads  the  young  mind  before  knowledge 
comes  and  reason  is  evolved.  Abnormally  it  Is 
often  seen  in  the  oversuggestible  mind,  persisting 
in  the  adult  life,  an  evidence  of  unsymmetrical 
mental  development.  Eeason  did  not  come  to  its 
own,  and  the  avenue  through  which  childhood's 
mind  was  influenced  remains  an  insufficient  chan- 
nel for  the  grown-up  mind. 

Most  suggestions  come  from  influences  appeal- 
ing to  the  imagination.  The  graphic  and  thrill- 


TANGLED  THOUGHTS  133 

ing  patent  medicine  advertisements  are  written 
for  the  suggestible  mind.  These  detailed  and 
vivid  accounts  of  symptoms,  often  not  really 
indicative  of  disease,  but  labelled  with  some  fear- 
some name  and  followed  by  accounts  of  marvellous 
cures,  have  for  many  years  drawn  streams  of 
dollars  from  the  pockets  of  penury — streams 
fairly  overflowing  the  coffers  of  wealth.  In  re- 
turn useless,  sometimes  even  harmful,  compounds 
have  been  given,  sufficiently  potent,  however,  to 
produce  imaginary  cures  of  imaginary  diseases. 
Much  nervous  invalidism  is  the  result  of  self- 
suggestion.  In  the  suggestible  the  idea  of  frailty, 
of  defect  of  sight,  inadequacy  of  digestion,  of 
inability  to  sleep — these  and  a  hundred  other 
deficiencies  or  disabilities  the  mind  may  suggest 
to  itself,  and  a  resulting  partial  or  complete 
invalidism  may  continue  for  years  until  a  stronger 
suggestion,  some  more  powerful  ideational  in- 
fluence, replaces  the  defective,  weakening  one ;  and 
perchance  the  miracle  of  restoration  is  performed ! 
Error  and  Illness. — Through  suggestibility  every 
known  organic  disease  may  be  imitated,  simulated 
through  expectation,  self-centredness  and  self- 
study  ;  every  known  set  of  symptoms  may  appear, 
reproducing  organic  disturbances  so  accurately  as 
to  deceive  the  elect.  Were  it  not  for  the  neurolo- 
gist's habit  of  keen  investigation  of  his  patient's 
mentality  and  ready  detection  of  suggestibility, 
with  his  knowledge  that  in  a  mind  so  constituted 
the  symptoms  of  organic  disease  can  be  repro- 
duced through  the  interrelation  of  mind  and  body, 
many  of  these  sufferers  would  remain  beyond 


134       THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

the  helpful  influence  of  medical  skill.  From  this 
large  class  of  the  suggestible  many  are  rescued 
from  tuberculosis,  from  cancer,  from  various 
forms  of  paralysis  and  languishing  beds  of  many 
years'  illness,  from  the  diseases  which  all  the 
doctors  in  the  neighbourhood  failed  to  cure  or 
understand! — none  of  which  existed  outside  the 
patient 's  mind  and  that  of  the  sympathetic  family 
and  credible  friends.  Thus  thousands  are  an- 
nually cured  by  this  or  that  patent  medicine, 
religious  influence,  or  special  forms  of  joint- 
stretching  or  nerve-rubbing  manipulations. 

Unfortunately,  the  over-solicitous  physician 
and  nurse,  not  recognising  the  suggestibility  of 
their  patient  and  the  undue  influence  which  their 
warnings  are  going  to  exercise,  may,  in  their 
desire  to  afford  a  protective  helpfulness,  do  unin- 
tentional but  lasting  damage  to  the  patient's 
self-confidence,  and  thereby  augment  his  tendency 
to  nervous  invalidism.  Many  a  patient  has  pro- 
ceeded to  suffer  all  the  symptoms  of  inflammation 
of  the  stomach  following  the  physician's  appre- 
hensive, "I  fear  you  are  threatened  with  gastri- 
tis." The  writer  has  met  numerous  cases  in 
which  the  patient  two,  three,  even  six  and  seven 
years  after  surgical  operations,  was  still  avoiding 
strengthening,  developing  and  health-giving  exer- 
cise because  of  the  fateful  warning  of  the  physician 
or  nurse  to  avoid  any  strain.  They  neglected 
to  neutralise  this  temporarily  helpful  injunction 
by  careful  and  explicit  directions  as  to  when,  and 
how,  to  resume  the  exercise  which  would 
strengthen,  and  make  perfect  the  cure  for  which 


TANGLED  THOUGHTS  135 

the  operation  was  done.  There  are,  unfortun- 
ately, poorly  prepared  physicians  and  ignorant 
nurses  whose  lack  of  knowledge  makes  them  a 
serious  menace  to  the  suggestible  patient,  who, 
accepting  their  word  as  authority,  may  suffer  long 
and  uselessly,  because  of  the  incapacitating  idea 
of  disease,  which  has  been  a  professional  contri- 
bution to  their  minds. 

The  sum  of  human  knowledge  is  such  that  no 
mind  can  span  its  entirety.  It  is  only  since 
Science  has  come  to  her  own,  that  even  the  best 
trained  have  had  knowledge,  at  all  adequate,  of 
the  nature  of  bodily  and  mental  ills.  The  com- 
plexities of  medical  science  are  such  that  to-day 
no  physician  pretends  to  keep  fully  abreast  with 
all  its  various  branches.  It  is  obviously  impos- 
sible, therefore,  for  the  lay  or  untrained  mind 
to  know  the  body,  its  needs,  the  mind  and  its 
intricate  relations;  to  understand  the  processes 
of  disease  and  the  complicated  effects  it  produces 
on  mind  and  body. 

Our  study  of  the  influence  of  error  upon  nervous 
health  has  thus  far  considered  it  a  result  of  igno- 
rance or  a  defect  of  development.  Few  minds 
are  perfectly  poised.  Many  overemphasise,  over- 
stress,  overfeel,  overwill;  more,  probably,  fail  to 
duly  emphasise,  and  live  years  of  depression  and 
undervaluation.  There  is  a  group  of  the  nerv- 
ously ill  who,  consciously  or  unconsciously,  find 
in  their  nervousness  a  defence.  They  are  thereby 
relieved  of  home  responsibilities;  the  burdens  of 
family  support  are  readjusted  so  as  to  fall  more 
lightly  on  their  shoulders.  The  nervous  child 


136        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

often  finds  herself  excused  from  school  and  home 
duties.  Many  a  career  is  cut  short,  education  lost 
and  future  blighted  because  of  nervousness. 
Nervousness  may  result  as  a  protective  defence, 
with  selfish  grief,  shallow  disappointment  or  the 
cowardly  fear  idea  as  a  basis.  Now  and  again 
there  are  those,  not  unconscious  of  their  surren- 
der, who  are  willing  to  live  vampire-like  upon  the 
very  strength  and  blood  of  loving  sacrifice.  So 
in  the  mental  manifestations  of  this  protein  dis- 
order, defence  reactions  may  end  in  surrenders, 
not  only  of  duty,  but  of  character. 

Our  thoughts  concerning  our  bodies  sometimes 
become  morbidly  domineering  and  demanding, 
and  so  controlling  that  we  frequently  surrender 
to  their  persistent  repetition,  even  when  we  more 
or  less  clearly  realise  the  damage  which  will 
follow.  The  insistent  idea  of  bodily  disability  or 
disturbance  then  so  largely  occupies  the  field  of 
consciousness  as  to  limit  the  mind's  activities  in 
other  directions.  Hypochondriasis  is  the  name 
given  this  form  of  tangled  thoughts,  and  when 
allowed  to  progress  unresisted  and  uncombated 
it  may  finally  make  hopeless  wreckage  of  life. 

When  judgment  fails  to  definitely  and  clearly 
assert  its  demands  for  truth,  the  imaginative 
thought  life,  an  outgrowth  of  the  normal  ideation 
of  the  child,  may  persist  as  an  unwholesome  habit 
into  adult  life,  and  the  vividness  of  what  is  truly 
fantastic  blur  reality.  There  is  no  known  limit 
that  can  curtail  the  intensity  and  immensity  of 
our  imaginings;  but  in  a  mind  of  activity,  the 
less  the  accurate  knowledge,  the  less  truth,  the 


TANGLED  THOUGHTS  137 

fewer  acquired  facts — the  less  one  really  knows, 
the  more  he  will  imagine.  And  so,  many  minds, 
which,  properly  trained,  might  have  developed  a 
high  degree  of  productive  capacity,  through  lack 
of  training  and  proper  discipline,  and  failure  to 
hold  hard  by  truth,  have  developed  morbid 
imaginings.  Day-dreams  and  longings  for  that 
which  is  not  probable,  perchance  not  possible, 
usually  not  deserved  and  never  honestly  earned, 
separate  further  and  further  the  real  from  the 
so-called  ideal,  and  out  of  the  fantastic  life  the 
wish-habit  grows.  The  day-dream  is  the  con- 
scious expression  of  the  elaborate,  usually  im- 
possible, and  not  infrequently  unwise  wish. 
Analysis  of  many  of  our  night-dreams  will  show 
that  they  are  distorted,  disguised  expressions  of 
our  wish-life — ofttimes  wishes  buried  from  con- 
sciousness and  rising  from  the  primitive  instincts 
— dreams  created  by  unthought  cravings.  There 
is  a  certain  type  whose  idealism  is  closely  allied 
to  sentimentalism,  who  turn  from  life's  realities 
as  being  too  crude,  too  far  from  the  truth  as  they 
would  have  it,  and  bury  themselves  in  the  unreal, 
and  ultimately  unprofitable,  fantastic.  Gradually 
imagination  more  and  more  supplants  reality,  the 
ability  to  recognise  truth  becomes  weakened  and 
defective ;  and  herein  is  developed  a  basis  of  much 
unconscious  simulation  and  deceit. 

Much  serious  hysteria  follows  accidents,  espe- 
cially accidents  in  which  responsibility  can  be 
laid  upon  some  wealthy  corporation,  hysteria 
manifesting  itself  in  continued  pain  or  paralysis, 
or  even  in  forms  of  blindness  or  mutism  or  joint 


138        THE  MASTEEY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

contractures,  but  the  resultant  deformities  may 
be  cured  as  by  magic  by  the  settlement  of  the 
damage  suit.  The  influence  of  the  wish  in  lives 
so  divorced  from  reason  or  control  is  powerful. 
In  some  the  surrender  in  the  life  discounted  by 
day-dreaming  may  grow  out  of  the  mind's 
inability  to  accept  the  truism  that  reality  never 
fulfils  the  ideal.  Man  can  ever  plan  more  than 
body,  mind  or  even  life  can  realise.  To  the 
thoughtful  there  exists  herein  a  suggestion  that 
there  are  possibilities  of  realisation  unknown  in 
our  present  sphere  of  existence.  In  the  errors 
into  which  the  mind  falls,  so  damaging  in  their 
effects  upon  progress  and  development,  errors 
which  allow  multitudes  to  grope  along  into  old 
age,  never  having  known  mental  mastery — we 
recognise  that  the  fault  has  been  in  our  selection 
of  the  thoughts  and  feelings  which  we  permitted 
to  occupy  the  centre  of  our  stage  of  consciousness. 
In  our  choice  of  actors  in  our  drama  of  life  we 
have  too  often  turned  over  the  serious  business  to 
mere  amateurs,  or  allowed  the  villain  to  play  the 
hero 's  part,  or  the  comedian  to  cheapen  that  which 
should  have  been  sacred. 

Again,  in  the  development  of  mind  it  becomes 
necessary  during  the  early  years  for  the  child 
to  be  the  object  of  much  attention.  In  being 
directed  physically  and  mentally,  in  discipline,  in 
the  teaching  of  courtesy,  at  school  and  in  the 
home,  the  child  receives  much  individual  attention. 
As  intelligence  wakens,  knowledge  broadens  and 
interests  multiply,  the  normal  mind  finds  outside 
of  self  that  which  attracts,  diverts,  distracts  and 


TANGLED  THOUGHTS  139 

fascinates.  Habits  form  rapidly  in  youth,  habits 
which  relieve  the  mind  of  much  of  effort  by  devel- 
oping the  automatic,  and  thereby  making  it  easy 
for  the  mind  to  externalise  its  interests,  while 
it  depends  on  the  subconscious,  the  automatic,  to 
care  for  many  of  the  body  needs,  and  for  much 
of  the  further  development  of  the  mind.  And  in 
life 's  duties  and  legitimate  pleasures,  in  the  great 
interrelations  of  society,  in  the  call  to  responsi- 
bility, and  in  the  satisfying  of  effort,  the  mature 
mind  is  busy  from  morning  to  night,  and  self- 
forgetfulness  becomes  a  wholesome,  saving  habit 
of  life.  But  through  overattention  in  childhood, 
through  repeated  and  unwise  references  in  the 
child's  presence  to  his  attractiveness  and  naive 
brightness  and  precocious  originality,  conceit 
grows,  an  excess  of  individualism  develops,  and 
self-centredness  may  persist  to  contract,  and  later 
to  deform,  or  even  to  distort  character.  Self- 
attention  is  largely  unprofitable  attention.  The 
habit  of  introspection  may  produce  the  "  shut-in " 
nature  which,  when  surrendered  to,  may  be  the 
basis  of  mental  disturbances.  To  the  mind 
centred  on  self,  adjustments  to  surroundings  must 
be  inadequate,  oversolicitude  concerning  our  con- 
dition, well-being,  present  and  future,  becomes 
distorted  and  inexact,  and  self-observation  be- 
comes a  disease. 

Many  of  the  pains  of  the  nervous  are  scienti- 
fically termed  "attention-pains."  If  we  concen- 
trate the  mind,  especially  with  any  degree  of 
apprehension,  upon  a  part  of  the  body,  that  part 
becomes  rapidly  more  sensitive.  All  active  per- 


140        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

sons  at  some  time  wrench  the  back  muscles  at 
the  waist-line.  This  simple  accident  may  develop 
into  an  incapacitating  weakness  when  the  mind 
anxiously  dwells  upon  these  sore  muscles,  fre- 
quently with  intensified  apprehension  through 
foolish  association  of  this  simple  hurt  with  kidney 
damage.  The  normal  individual  would  laughingly 
grunt  for  a  few  days  about  his  condition,  whereas 
in  the  neurotic,  a  permanent  weakness  may 
supervene,  and  years  later  the  patient  be  slouch- 
ing in  an  easy  chair,  protecting  himself  from  the 
attention-pains  born  of  a  physically  harmless 
injury.  Pains  galore  and  depressions  unspeak- 
able are  the  constant  outgrowth  of  the  damage 
of  self-attention.  So  again  we  have  been  con- 
sidering examples  of  hurt  growing  out  of  unwise 
selection,  of  unwise  thought  choice. 

With  the  exception  of  self-attention  necessary 
for  the  formation  of  wholesome  habits  in  child- 
hood, a  small  amount  of  self-thought,  of  self-study 
and  self -analysis,  ^dth  an  infinitesimal  amount  of 
self -commiseration,  should  be  the  law  of  all  who 
would  avoid  the  insidious  development  of  nervous 
hurt,  the  certain  penalty  of  habitual  self-centred- 
ness.  Power  of  physique,  strength  of  constitu- 
tion, perfect  digestion  and  unquestioned  circula- 
tion— in  fact,  robust  health — are  ineffective  when 
ruled  by  a  mind  led  by  morbid  questionings  based 
upon  false  ideas,  accepting  the  testimony  of  fear- 
some emotions,  and  sensitively  and  irrationally 
suggestible.  A  mind  looking  for  excuses  to  avoid 
life's  duties;  a  mentality  that  watches  the  body's 
every  movement,  that  studies  its  heart-throbs,  and 


TANGLED  THOUGHTS  141 

takes  undue  account  of  those  pains  and  temporary 
disabilities  inherent  in  all  normal  living,  will 
create  nervousness  in  even  the  physically  perfect. 
No  physique,  regardless  of  its  innate  strength, 
can  resist  the  insidious,  damaging  influence  of 
the  disease-accepting  mind.  The  healthy  body  is 
ultimately  helpless  when  a  victim  of  tangled 
thought-control. 


CHAPTER  XII 
EMOTIONAL  TYRANNY 

Nature  of  the  Emotions. — In  the  mind's  efforts 
at  adjustment  three  channels  are  open.  In  the 
properly  developed  mind,  intelligence,  with  its 
accurate  array  of  facts,  its  careful  selection  and 
definite  decision,  makes  the  most  perfect  mental 
adjustments  possible.  The  universally  respected 
judicial  mind  is  of  this  type ;  true  leaders  in  prog- 
ress and  constructive  organisers  are  thus  mentally 
constituted.  But  while  one  leads,  many  follow. 
The  average  person  unconsciously  depends  upon 
imitation,  the  second  possibility  of  adjustment; 
and  thus  the  majority  do  as  their  elders  did,  and, 
following  the  paths  already  worn  across  life's 
meads  and  fens,  seldom  risk  losing  their  way  by 
venturesome  excursions.  Imitation  solves  the 
cut  of  most  coats,  lengthens  and  shortens  skirts, 
attires  serving  maids,  popularises  the  year's 
novels,  chooses  the  new  auto,  and  even  selects 
subjects  for  and  decides  the  style  of  many  minis- 
ters' sermons.  Cultivated  reason  presupposes 
long  training,  and  intelligent  imitation  is  only 
possible  when  observation  has  been  cultivated, 
and  some  critical  sense  developed.  Undeveloped, 
untrained,  uneducated  man  through  all  time  has 
required  his  channel  of  adjustment,  also.  Primi- 
tive and  simple  leadings  his  may  be,  perchance, 

142 


EMOTIONAL  TYRANNY  143 

but  whether  protective  or  aggressive  or  meagrely 
j  productive,  the  instinctive  ever-present  emotional 
(life  has  ever  been  mankind's  inherent  directing 
force. 

Simply  stated,  our  emotions  embrace  all  experi- 
jences  which  we  include  under  the  terms  pleasant 
j  and  unpleasant.    It  is  easy  to  see  the  instinctive 
{influence  of  pleasure  in  attracting  us  toward  that 
?  which    is    pleasure-producing,    and    the    equally 
primitive  nature  of  the  repelling  influence  of  the 
unpleasant.     Each  mental  act  is  associated  with 
some  emotional  reaction,  and  the  restless  ebb  and 
flow  of  the  ocean's  tide  is  sluggishness  indeed, 
I  when  compared  with  the  constant  attraction  and 
repulsion  accompanying  every  conscious  thought. 
Emotional   life   knows    no   neutral    states.     Our 
:  feelings  have  no  dead  centre.     The  animal  king- 
dom is   dominated  by  emotions.     The   stranger 
approaches,  curiosity  impels  the  dog  to  run  f or- 
jward  to  investigate;  there  is  a  threatening  ges- 
ture, in  anger  an  attack  is  made,  and  following 
I  the  well-directed  blow,  the  yelping  retreat  of  fear. 
i  Curiosity,  anger,  fear — how  large  a  span  of  human 
activities  has   its   origin  in  these   three  primal 
!  channels  of  emotional  adjustment !     The  emotions 
are  our  inherited  counsellors.     They  appear  early, 
I  and  are  the  sole  guide  to  action  until  superseded 
'by    slowly    acquired   intellect.     In   the   nervous, 
!  emotional  intensity  is  overemphasised ;  in  the  true 
;  neurotic  an  excessive  tendency  to  emotional  re- 
i  sponse  is  a  fundamental  weakness,  which  can  only 
|be  displaced  by  serious  and  tedious  years  of  ra- 
tional training,  which  many  of  the  presumably 


144        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

educated  have  failed  to  -undertake.  To-day  the 
anomaly  of  high  intellectual  attainments  with 
defective  emotional  mastery  is  commonly  ob- 
served. 

In  everyday  language  we  speak  of  the  emotions 
as  the  "feelings,"  and  both  words  suggest  pos- 
sible sensation.  In  our  experience,  all  pleasur- 
able thoughts  do  produce  a  sense  of  physical 
comfort  and  well-being  or  relief,  while  the  un- 
pleasant are  associated  with  painful  feelings, 
discomfort  or  weariness.  There  is  a  reason  for 
these  associated  sensations.  The  l  '  sympathetic, ' ' 
an  important  division  of  the  nervous  system  which 
cannot  be  directly  influenced  through  the  conscious 
mind,  has  control  of  all  the  muscular  movements 
upon  which  many  of  the  activities  of  the  vital 
organs  depend.  Here  mind  and  body  clasp  hands. 
The  fear  thought,  through  the  sympathetic  nerves 
which  control  the  heart's  activities,  causes  that 
organ,  even  in  the  face  of  determination  to  the 
contrary,  to  double  the  force  and  number  of  its 
beats.  The  many  thousand  nerve  endings  con- 
trolling the  involuntary  muscles  in  the  walls  of 
minute  blood  vessels  influence  these  muscles  to 
contract,  and  the  face  turns  ashy  white.  Other 
branches  of  this  same  sensitive  nervous  mechan- 
ism supplying  the  saliva-producing  glands  check 
their  activity,  and  suddenly  the  mouth  is  dry; 
while  still  other  nerves  influencing  certain  invol- 
untary muscles  of  the  eye  dilate  the  pupil,  pro- 
ducing the  wild,  staring  look  of  extreme  fear. 
The  stream  of  sensation  then  overflows  into  the 
voluntary  muscles ;  the  brow  of  the  blanched  face 


EMOTIONAL  TYRANNY  145 

;  is  contracted,  the  jaw  drops,  the  fingers  stiffen, 
i  and  the  whole  body  is  transfixed  in  terror.    It 
i  may  be  but  a  stray  sheet  from  the  neighbour's 
wash  flapping  out  suddenly  in  the  darkness  from 
I  between  the  rails  of  the  fence — and  no  ghost  at 
all!     With  every  sensation  which  we  call  feeling 
:  there  is  relaxation  or  contraction  of  some  of  the 
i  innumerable  involuntary  muscle  fibres  which  are 
I  interwoven  with  the  structure  of  our  vital  organs. 
|  Through  the  ever-responsive,  never-resting  sym- 
I  pathetic  nervous  system,  the  desires  of  the  mind 
I  are  translated  into  the  pulsations  of  the  heart; 
|  the  anguish  of  fear  breaks  out  in  beads  of  chill- 
:  ing  sweat ;  anticipation  fairly  causes  the  mouth  to 
water.    All  such  reactions,  absolutely  beyond  the 
influence  of  will,  are  accompanied  with  sensations, 
indistinct,  indefinite,  generalised,  yet  marking  the 
•  temporal  unity  of  mind  and  body.     But,  as  already 
;  indicated,  in  the  more  intense  expressions  of  our 
j  emotions,  the  voluntary  muscles  frequently  take 
part,  as  illustrated  in  the  clenched  fist  of  defiance, 
the  gnashing  teeth  of  anguish,  the  stamping  foot 
of  impatience,  the  vehemently  shaking  head  of 
denial,  or  the  resolute,  erect  carriage  of  deter- 
mination.    Our  thoughts  may  cause  our  bodies  to 
fairly  vibrate  from  finger-tip  to  heart  's-co re. 

But  other  influences  produce  relaxation  and  con- 
1  traction  of  these  involuntary  muscle  threads 
which  are  so  intimate  a  part  of  our  vital  organs. 
A  drop  of  atropin  solution  in  the  eye,  and  the 
pupil  widely  dilates  and  stares  hopelessly  for  days ; 
while  in  the  other  eye  a  solution  of  eserin  reduces 
the  pupil  to  pin-point  size.  Through  the  chronic 


146       THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

self -poisoning  of  dietary  ignorance  and  indul- 
gence, involuntary  muscle  fibres  in  vessel  and 
gland  walls  remain  for  days  and  months  in  con- 
stant spasm.  A  stiff  toddy  flushes  the  face  for 
hours  and  affords  a  temporary  relaxation  to  this 
condition  of  unnatural  vessel  spasm — a  relaxation 
which  stands  for  an  evanescent  comfort.  On  the 
other  hand,  the  inveterate  alcoholic  lives  in  a  state 
of  continuous  overrelaxation  of  vital  tissues,  due 
to  the  toxic,  paralysing  influence  of  his  drug. 
But  few  have  not  experienced  acute  emotional 
depression,  with  accompanying  disturbances  in 
circulation,  the  result  of  self -poisoning  from  their 
own  decomposed  foods.  Multitudes  live  autotoxic 
years  of  emotional  misery  and  subconscious  un- 
rest because  of  the  intimate,  relentless  action  of 
body  on  mind  through  this  same  toxically  dis- 
turbed sympathetic  nervous  system.  Victims  of 
periodic  attacks  of  the  blues — really  acute  ex- 
pressions of  modified  melancholia — are  emotion- 
ally depressed  from  food  poisons.  Such  self- 
produced  irritants  stimulate  overcontraction  of 
the  involuntary  muscles.  Tobacco  and  alcohol 
produce  the  opposite  condition,  and  tend  to 
paralyse,  and  thus  relax,  these  same  muscles. 
Hence  the  explanation  of  the  periodic  alcoholic, 
who  will  risk  his  soul  for  drink,  as  he  feels  the 
murderous  black  pall  of  his  toxic  depression 
settling  upon  him.  Hence  also  the  common  habit 
of  alcohol-using  with  overeating,  the  blind  ef- 
fort of  unreason  to  anticipate  food-produced  dis- 
turbances, to  create  a  right  out  of  two  wrongs. 
Chronic  emotional  depression,  the  legitimate  re- 


EMOTIONAL  TYRANNY  147 

suit  of  the  broken  balance  between  food  and  ex- 
ercise, caused  though  it  may  be  by  the  chemical 
toxins,  reflects  its  damage  not  only  on  the  body, 
but  upon  the  mind  itself,  which  it  holds  a 
prisoner  without  hope.  Shallow  breathing,  slug- 
gish circulation,  defective  elimination  of  excre- 
tions, inadequate  glandular  activity — in  fact,  a 
chronic  lowered  vital  tone — are  constant  results 
of  food  and  drug  intoxication,  while  the  identical 
conditions  may  be  the  constant  accompaniments 
of  low-grade  emotional  states. 

Three  sets  of  emotions  are  associated  with 
every  a'ct.  Emotions  of  anticipation  precede  all 
doing.  When  we  look  forward  with  pleasure  to 
what  is  to  happen,  we  enjoy  the  wholesome  emo- 
tion of  hope ;  if  we  plan  with  dread  and  fear,  our 
anticipations  are  weighted  down  with  the  emotion 
of  worry.  In  the  midst  of  action  we  experience 
the  emotions  of  participation,  and  if  all  is  going 
as  we  would  have  it,  we  feel  pleasure ;  but  if  things 
are  wrong,  if  hurt  or  injury  is  occurring,  we  ex- 
perience pain.  After  the  act,  when  our  antici- 
pations have  been  fulfilled,  we  experience  the 
pleasurable  emotion  of  realisation  called  satisfac- 
tion; but  if  the  experience  has  been  hurtful  or 
damaging,  we  look  back  upon  the  occurrence  with 
a  realisation  of  regret.  And  so  the  light  and 
shadow,  the  tint  and  tone  of  emotion  anticipates, 
accompanies,  and  follows  our  every  act,  and  our 
feeling  life  is  as  restless  as  the  ocean's  tide. 
There  are  refinements  of  the  emotional  life  asso- 
ciated with  the  higher  activities  of  our  critical 
sense  and  our  moral  nature  which  we  term  senti- 


148        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

ments,  but  no  possible  refinement  can  separate 
feeling  from  its  relation  to  the  physical.  The 
most  highly  refined  of  our  sensibilities  lay  hold 
upon  circulation  or  secretion,  or  touch  the  magical 
eye,  which  ever  responds  to  the  feeling  within. 
The  sensations  of  ecstasy  are  as  truly  based  on 
the  physical  as  the  cramps  of  stomach-ache. 

Power  of  the  Emotions. — There  are  emotions 
that  invigorate,  stimulate  and  elevate;  there  are 
those  that  wilt  and  crush  and  deaden.  We  have 
seen  that  the  interrelation  of  mind  and  body,  like 
all  good  rules,  works  both  ways,  and  as  hurtful 
toxic  conditions  can  produce  distressing  emotional 
reactions,  so  active  or  prolonged  mental  states 
may  call  forth  definite  physical  reactions.  Who 
as  a  child  has  not  felt  the  choking,  aching  lump 
in  his  throat — that  distressing  physical  accom- 
paniment of  the  yearning  for  home  and  mother  too 
deep  for  tears?  And  who  again,  when  caught 
red-handed  in  some  childish  depredation,  has  not 
found  vocal  chords  paralysed,  and  been  able  to  re- 
spond to  the  stern  questionings  of  the  unexpected 
parent  only  with  painful  efforts  at  swallowing! 
And  who  has  not,  a  few  years  later,  felt  his  cheeks 
fairly  flame  with  livid  and  burning  embarrass- 
ment, when,  helpless  in  his  awkwardness,  he 
commits  a  faux  pas  in  the  presence  of  the  Only 
One!  And  in  later  years  the  pain  of  our  great 
sorrow  has  rested  as  a  weight  over  the  heart, 
pressing  down  as  a  leaden  heel.  Sweating,  chill- 
ing, flushing  and  paling,  tearful  or  dry  eyes, 
clammy  or  burning  skins,  choking  throats,  uncom- 
fortable, cramping  stomachs,  and  numerous  other 


EMOTIONAL  TYEANNY  149 

forms  of  bodily  distress,  may  be  but  the  physical 
reactions  to  disturbing  emotions.  Such  discom- 
forts, possibly  prolonged  through  days  or  months, 
may  be  interpreted  by  the  mind  as  painful  sensa- 
tions, the  result  of  genuine  physical  disease.  The 
more  sensitive  the  nervous  organisation,  the  more 
acute  it  is  to  the  sensations  of  involuntary 
muscular  movement  which  accompany  feeling.  In 
the  untutored  mind  which  is  studying  the  body's 
sensations,  there  exists  in  such  physical  discom- 
fort, in  the  numerous  alterations  in  secretion  or 
activity  of  vital  parts,  ample  reason  to  confound 
the  feelings  normal  to  emotional  change  with  the 
sensations  common  to  disease.  Here  is  found  the 
explanation  for  that  almost  endless  list  of  symp- 
toms which,  like  the  clouds  of  a  stormy  day,  troop, 
one  after  another,  across  the  horizon  of  the  over- 
sensitive, self -observant  neurotic's  life.  Like 
poor,  distraught,  terror-tense  Eoderick  Usher, 
who  heard  the  beatings  of  his  supposedly  dead 
sister's  buried  heart  for  days  before  her  tragic 
resurrection,  many  of  the  overwrought  nervous 
live  terror-tense,  listening  to  each  internal  throb 
as  though  an  avenging  spirit  threatened.  Emo- 
tions may  be  as  powerful  for  good  as  for  damage. 
We  shall  learn  later  of  the  superbly  beneficent 
influence  of  wholesome  emotions  as  preserving, 
blessing  and  reconstructing  forces  in  life. 

The  power  of  the  emotions  to  influence  the  body, 
to  produce  disturbing  and  even  distressing  sen- 
sations, to  discount  physical  strength  and  occa- 
sionally to  curtail  life  itself,  is  of  secondary 
importance  to  their  power  over  the  mind.  In- 


150       THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

tellect,  feeling  and  will  are  the  interwoven, 
interrelated  trinity  which  constitutes  the  mind, 
and  in  the  mind's  development  the  emotional  life 
has  the  earliest  chance  and  the  most  constant 
chance  to  influence — and  influence  it  does,  even  the 
most  stolid.  Child  of  instinct,  small  wonder  that 
it  is  the  accepted  directing  force  for  the  majority, 
and  a  suggesting,  begging,  nagging,  appealing, 
demanding  influence  in  all  lives.  "I  feel"  and 
'  '  I  don 't  feel, ' ' — what  portentous  decrees  abide  in 
these  simple  words!  How  rare  is  the  one  with 
whom  a  day's  association  fails  to  elicit  one  or  the 
other  of  these  expressions !  How  extremely  rare 
the  man  who  rigorously  ignores  their  wooing  and 
beckoning  insistence !  How  superb  the  character 
who  knows  not  surrender  to  their  dominating  or 
insinuating  authority,  and  whose  "I  believe"  or 
"I  will"  is  their  potent  master! 

The  feelings  produce  the  lighting  effects  on 
life's  canvas.  The  real  substance  of  the  mind's 
action,  the  truth  and  problems  of  intellectual 
activity,  the  realities  of  experience,  are  only  seen 
in  their  true  value  by  the  clear  eye  of  reason. 
The  high  lights  and  the  depths  of  shadow  in  the 
picture  are  the  result  of  emotional  influence. 
But  in  many  minds  the  substance  is  obscured  by 
the  colouring,  is  blurred  by  the  lights  and 
shadows^;  and  reality,  the  actuality  of  conditions, 
the  clear  outlines  of  truth,  are  lost  in  the  emotional 
haze.  In  the  mind  in  which  emotional  domination 
is  persistent,  the  ability  to  estimate  events  at 
their  true  value  fails  to  develop.  The  habit  of 
basing  opinions  upon  the  evidence  of  feeling 


EMOTIONAL  TYRANNY  151 

practically  obstructs  the.  development  of  reason, 
and  when  the  testimony  of  feeling  continues  so 
much  stronger  than  the  judicial  voice  of  intellect, 
lives  of  impulse  result,  lives  in  which  decisions 
are  based  on  morbid  judgment,  not  on  the  counsel 
of  reason.  The  logic  of  such  lives  is  the  logic 
of  feeling,  pure  logic  being  crippled  by  false 
valuations,  daily  and  hourly  accepted  as  legal 
tender.  And  in  the  lives  of  the  nervous,  with 
temptation  ever  strong  to  false  valuations  and 
overreaction  to  surroundings,  emotional  domin- 
ance becomes  a  quick-sand  in  which  the  children 
of  reason  and  will  and  happiness  are  engulfed. 
It  is  rare  for  the  emotional  temperament  to  profit 
by  an  hour  of  earnest  contemplation.  The  brown- 
study  habit  has  not  been  acquired,  except  in  the 
perverted  form  of  blue-black  moods.  Calm,  ac- 
curate, logical,  constructive  thinking  and  reason- 
ing are  never  possible  in  the  face  of  unmastered, 
aggressive  emotions. 

The  nervous  temperament  is  remarkable  for  its 
sensitive  emotional  balance.  But  in  nervousness, 
this  margin  is  so  narrow  as  to  render  the  expendi- 
ture of  force  necessary  to  maintain  nervous 
stability  an  energy-exhausting  effort.  Emotional 
exaltation  is  daily  observed  in  unnecessary  excite- 
ment, shallow  enthusiasm,  hysterical  efferves- 
cence ;  but  far  more  frequently  emotional  depres- 
sion is  the  defect — depression  varying  from  the 
momentary  questioning  of  self  to  the  intense  and 
unreasoning  desperation  of  the  feeling  of  suicidal 
unworthiness.  One  of  the  truly  difficult  problems 
in  the  reeducation  of  the  neurotic  is  found  in  the 


152       THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

attainment  of  emotional  poise,  of  such  stability 
of  feelings  as  to  conserve  the  disintegrating  waste 
of  constant  emotional  wear  and  tear.  Such  minds 
are  prone  to  repudiate  the  dictates  of  reason  in 
matters  of  spiritual  teaching.  Much  of  religious 
insistence  is  directed  toward  feeling  and  not 
toward  reason;  indeed,  there  are  many  who  feel 
that  in  reasoning  over  matters  spiritual  they 
indulge  in  sacrilege.  Therefore  many,  even  of 
those  who  depend  upon  rational  guidance  and  the 
leadings  of  common  sense  in  their  secular  life, 
are  easily  led  to  exaggeration  and  fanaticism  in 
religion.  Church  history  teems  with  lives  of 
emotional  exaltations  and  depressions  encompass- 
ing the  extremes  of  sainthood  and  demon-posses- 
sion. 

Emotional  Tyranny. — Emotional  supremacy 
stands  for  an  instability  as  pronounced  as  the 
restless  waveline  on  the  fretful  ocean's  beach. 
And  as  the  unstable  sea  itself,  in  many  the  emo- 
tions rise  in  damaging  destructiveness  and  find 
^expression  in  murderous  fury.  Man  in  the  grip 
of  primeval  passions  may  become  a  frightful 
being.  Anger  may  develop  as  suddenly  as  the 
tropical* hurricane,  and  wrench  and  wreck  and 
dash  into  pieces  its  victim.  Anger  springs  full- 
fledged  from  man's  fight-instinct,  and  is  one  of 
his  most  primitive  adjustments  to  opposition. 
From  its  most  intense  expression  in  which  its 
victim  fairly  sees  red,  anger  may  be  manifested 
in  many  forms  of  lesser  intensity.  Sullenness 
and  sulkiness  indicate  partial  repression,  but  im- 
patience and  irritability  are  much  more  common 


EMOTIONAL  TYBANNY  153 

to  the  nervous;  few  of  this  class  do  not  almost 
habitually  surrender  to  this  hurtful  strength- 
leakage,  and  the  habit  of  irritability  grows  apace, 
and  many  lives,  even  in  their  early  strength,  have 
been  mastered  thereby.  So  weak  has  their  self- 
control  become,  that  few  hours  are  spent  at  work, 
or  even  in  the  seeking  of  pleasure,  not  dishonoured 
by  eruptions  of  selfish  irritability.  Like  the 
chronic  alcoholic,  they  can  only  keep  themselves 
decently  comfortable  by  repeated  sprees.  This 
emotional  weakness  may  become  so  ingrained  as 
to  quickly  exhaust  the  will  in  its  effort  to  resist 
these  outbreaks,  so  in  surrender  relief  is  found 
from  exhausting  control.  Hate  is  another  of  the 
destructive  passions  which,  when  it  fastens  itself 
upon  the  heart,  with  or  without  reason,  curdles 
therein  the  very  milk  of  human  kindness — that 
essential  food  for  happiness.  Hate  can  fairly 
distort  the  body  and  dwarf  its  soul ;  it  can  poison 
the  mind  until  reason  is  dead.  But  in  the  nervous 
it  is  not  the  excessive  expressions  of  this  passion 
that  are  commonly  met,  but  its  host  of  deformed 
children.  The  ever-reiterated  dislikes,  the  antag- 
onistic habit  and  the  unfair  judgments  based  upon 
such  influences,  explain  a  large  part  of  the  unhap- 
pily unsocial  histories  of  many  of  the  nervous. 

But  the  emotional  arch-enemy  of  human  peace  is 
fear.  It  plays  a  tremendous  role  in  human  life, 
and  many,  very  many  imperfect  human  adjust- 
ments are  the  result  of  its  demoralising  influ- 
ences. It  is  the  father  of  deception,  the  influence 
which  forces  dishonourable  surrender  or  disas- 
trous and  unworthy  retreat,  or  shameful  headlong 


154       THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

flight  from  the  post  of  honour  or  duties '  demands. 
Fear  paralyses  effort  and  causes  many  to  turn 
from  the  strife  of  life  and  subsist  on  the  husks  of 
indolence.  Fear  may  produce  unreasoning  frenzy 
of  action,  with  prodigal  wasting  of  strength,  fight- 
ing hopelessly,  because  irrationally.  Fear  ap- 
pears in  acute  expressions  of  terror,  follows  the 
hunted  soul  through  the  years  with  the  persistence 
of  a  shadow;  fear  enters  the  council  chamber  in 
the  form  of  anticipatory  dread,  robbing  many  de- 
cisions of  the  zest  and  confidence  which  would 
bring  success ;  fear  in  the  form  of  wretched  worry 
vitiates  every  plan  and  project.  In  their  more 
violent  expressions,  anger,  hate  and  fear  may  in- 
stantly lash  the  unrestrained  neurotic  into  a  froth 
of  frenzy,  in  which  mere  brute  instincts,  with 
their  appeal  to  coarse,  crude  force,  have  sway,  and 
for  the  time  being  the  whole  kingdom  of  reason 
is  in  lawless  chaos.  But  the  total  harm  of  these 
cataclysmic  emotional  convulsions  is  small  when 
compared  with  the  accumulation  of  unrelenting, 
insidious  manifestations  of  the  milder,  habitual 
expressions  of  these  same  damage  emotions.  Ir- 
ritability, the  habit  of  dislikes,  hourly  dreads  and 
worries,  associate  themselves  with  and  discount, 
discolour  and  deform  the  thoughts  before  they 
find  expression  through  the  will.  The  total  dam- 
age of  harmful  emotional  habits  can  only  be  re- 
alised through  an  intimate  knowledge  of  the 
world's  nervous  suffering.  Such  habits  may  not 
only  injure  each  thought  and  impulse  and  desire, 
but  may  find  more  permanent  expression  in  the 
form  of  moods  which  are  chronic  emotional  states. 


EMOTIONAL  TYRANNY  155 

In  depressed  individuals  moods  create  an  atmos- 
phere which  fairly  poisons  the  thought-life. 

In  a  rather  serious  form  of  nervousness  termed 
psychasthenia,  the  patient  is  possessed  with  fear 
ideas,  technically  called  ' l  phobias. ' '  The  psychas- 
thenic's  reason  may  tell  him  how  absurd  are  his 
fears,  but  they  are  so  much  stronger  in  their 
insistence  than  the  will  is  in  its  persistence,  that 
surrender  follows  surrender.  The  psychasthenic 
may  at  times  sadly  laugh  at  his  own  foolish  fears 
— but  it  is  a  sad  laugh  and  a  rare  laugh,  for  he  is 
a  miserable  sufferer  of  the  disease  of  fear.  He 
retreats,  pale  and  agitated,  from  crowds,  discon- 
tinues church  and  later  the  theatre,  because  of  his 
unreasoning  dread  of  crowded  places;  is  unable 
to  cross  an  open  field  because  of  the  equally  un- 
reasoning dread  of  being  where  he  cannot  put  his 
hands  on  something  for  support,  or  feel  the  pres- 
ence of  shelter,  and  so  follows  the  fence  from 
corner  to  corner  rather  than  trust  himself  alone 
in  the  midst  of  space.  He  circles  around  the  edge 
of  the  park,  for  he  is  miserable  in  the  midst  of 
its  spacious  beauties.  Again,  he  is  in  a  panic  of 
terror  in  a  room  with  closed  doors  and  windows, 
and  assures  you  that  he  would  "die  of  f right " 
were  he  accidentally  locked  in  a  cramped  closet. 
There  is  a  fear  of  dirt  and  fear  of  filth  which  is 
unholy — the  fear  of  contamination,  of  infection, 
or  of  germs,  which  causes  its  poor  victim  to  wash 
and  wash  and  wash,  often  until  hands  and  arms 
are  raw  and  even  ulcerated.  No  dish  is  fit  for 
use  which  he  has  not  seen  painstakingly  and  thor- 
oughly washed  and  rewashecj.  The  laundry  is. 


156       THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

returned  the  second  and  third  time  for  fear  it  is 
still  contaminated. 

Modern  psychology  dips  rather  deeply  into 
man's  primitive  instincts  to  find  a  satisfactory 
explanation  for  these  unreasonable  fears — fears 
which,  unchecked  by  rigid  and  resolute  self-con- 
trol, or  if  this  is  impossible,  by  the  force  of  wise 
counsel,  may  lead  from  a  condition  of  physical 
ridiculousness  to  the  tragedy  of  mental  eruption. 
The  writer  was  recently  thrown  with  such  a  fear 
victim  for  twenty-four  hours  on  a  sleeper.  Dur- 
ing that  time  he  gargled  and  rinsed  his  throat  at 
least  twenty  times  with  repeated  cups  of  ice- 
water,  into  which,  on  each  occasion,  was  poured 
a  teaspoonful  of  reasonably  strong  antiseptic; 
and  after  each  gargling  process,  from  ten  to 
twenty  minutes  would  be  spent  in  vociferous 
coughing  and  hawking  and  spitting,  to  the  legiti- 
mate disgust  of  all  the  passengers.  Between 
times  he  made  frequent  attempts  to  see  into  his 
throat  in  the  smoking-room  mirrors,  making  re- 
peated explanations  that  he  had  just  spent  a  night 
in  a  city  having  a  national  reputation  as  a  tuber- 
culosis resort,  and  'that  he  knew  he  had  a  germ 
in  his  throat,  because  he  could  feel  it ! '  Fear  was 
so  strong,  reason  so  helpless,  and  will  so  weak  in 
this  poor  man,  so  sane  on  general  subjects  as  to 
have  made  a  comfortable  fortune  in  lumber  in- 
terests, as  to  allow  him  to  thus  make  himself  a 
public  nuisance,  an  object  of  ridicule  and  revul- 
sion. Even  the  serious  professional  statement 
that  the  throat  of  the  healthy  child  harbours  mil- 
lions of  germs,  and  that  if  perchance  he  did  have 


EMOTIONAL  TYRANNY  157 

a  temporary  extra  tubercular  supply,  there  was  no 
danger  unless  he  injured  the  mucous  membrane 
of  his  throat  and  made  it  possible  for  them  to 
gain  admission  into  the  tissues,  had  no  influence. 
Fear  was  gripping  his  throat  muscles,  throwing 
them  into  a  state  of  continuous  contraction,  which 
he  interpreted  as  the  presence  of  germs,  and  with 
might  and  main  he  made  all  possible  effort  to 
damage  the  protective  coverings  of  his  throat,  and 
to  invite  danger  from  the  germ-laden  dust  of  travel 
infinitely  more  real  than  the  germs  of  the  sanitary 
but  dreaded  health-resort  from  which  he  was  flee- 
ing. 

The  Western  mind  looks  with  aversion  and  pity 
upon  the  poor,  mutilated,  deformed  victims  of  re- 
ligious zeal,  the  mendicant  votaries  of  India,  self- 
tortured  for  conscience'  sake;  and  yet  could  we 
but  have  revealed  the  twisted,  mutilated,  deformed 
souls  of  many  of  the  victims  of  the  self-torture  of 
fear,  we  would  stand  aghast  at  the  damning  in- 
fluence of  this  brutal  emotional  tyrant.  Life  is 
strewn  with  unhappy  nervous  wrecks,  the  hapless 
victims  of  fear  of  disease,  fear  of  contamination, 
fear  of  infection,  fear  of  failure,  fear  of  poverty, 
fear  of  ridicule,  fear  of  discovery,  fear  of  enemies, 
fear  of  dishonour,  fear  of  to-morrow,  fear  of  the 
now,  fear  of  death  and  fear  of  eternity — fear- 
some, f lightsome,  fearful  fear! 

We  have  thus  rapidly  reviewed  the  nature  of 
our  mind's  emotions,  the  intimate  interrelation 
between  physical  and  feeling  conditions;  we  have 
seen  how  interactive  each  is  upon  the  other,  how 
common  is  the  presence  of  defective  and  damaging 


158        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

emotional  habits  in  the  nervous,  how  prone  in- 
deed is  the  nervous  temperament  to  become  a  vic- 
tim of  its  feeling  life.  Worthy  invalidism  pre- 
sents many  reasons  for  patience  and  gentleness 
and  love  and  devotion,  and  offers  one  of  life's 
most  perfect  objects  for  wholesome  service;  but 
some  invalids  <are  repellently  ugly  in  their  sick- 
ness, an  ugliness  growing  out  of  the  unworthiness 
of  their  emotional  life.  The  dominating  impa- 
tience, selfish  petulance  and  heartless  disregard 
for  all  rights  save  those  of  their  own  whims,  con- 
vert them  into  at  best  but  pitiable  objects  of  com- 
miseration. And  the  lesson  comes  clear  and 
strong  that  for  the  best  of  us  there  are  many 
emotions  which  should  be  habitually  shunned ;  that 
fear  is  to  be  feared  and  hate  hated ;  that  it  is  only 
through  mastery  of  the  emotional,  ease  of  reserve 
of  strength,  power  to  do  thus  and  yet  more,  that 
we  may  avoid  premature  exhaustion  and  the  life 
of  chronic  weariness,  so  constant  with  the  emo- 
tional spendthrift.  Until  mastered,  our  emo- 
tional self  is  ever  ready  to  rebel  at  reason,  is 
eager  and  tugging  to  assume  the  ascendency  and 
subjugate  reason  and  will,  and  to  rule  our  minds 
with  a  despotic  tyranny  which  knows  no  law  but 
fickleness,  considers  no  time  but  now,  which  recog- 
nises no  master  but  desire,  and  obeys  no  voice  but 
the  call  for  gratification. 


CHAPTER  XIII 
ILLS  AND  OUR  WILLS 

Nature  of  the  Will. — Man's  will  is  his  great 
battlefield  upon  which,  daily  and  hourly,  contend- 
ing forces  of  his  nature  meet  in  strife.  Instinct 
wars  with  Eeason,  Desire  is  ever  attempting  to 
overcome  Resolution,  Indolence  creeps  upon  the 
rear  of  Ambition,  and  Indecision  hovers  as  a 
pestilence  over  the  camp  of  Determination  to 
weaken  the  mind's  best  fighters.  The  best  and 
worst  of  the  mind's  forces  meet  on  this  field  of 
strife  to  wage  a  warfare  often  as  long  as  life 
itself,  for  rarely  does  absolute  victory  crown  the 
efforts  of  character's  defenders,  or  complete  sur- 
render leave  character  in  the  hands  of  its  foes. 

To  the  intellect  has  been  ascribed  as  its  unique 
superiority  the  power  of  selection.  Out  of  life's 
interminable  multiplicity  of  possible  thoughts,  the 
mind  elects  from  moment  to  moment  those  to 
which  it  shall  give  consideration;  but  intellect 
would  be  helpless,  and  find  its  selection  of  as  little 
permanency  or  use  as  the  child's  soap-bubble, 
were  it  not  for  the  power  of  the  will  to  hold  the 
mind's  attention  upon  the  selected  object  of 
thought;  and  herein  is  the  will's  omnipotence. 
It  can  attend  or  refuse  to  attend  to  the  object  of 
thought  presented  to  it  by  the  intellect.  The 

159 


160        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

reader  can  will  to  note  carefully  the  meaning  of 
each  word  of  this  page,  associating  each  one 
clearly  with  the  others,  pausing  or  repeating,  if 
necessary,  that  all  may  be  plain ;  or  he  can  glance 
from  one  line  to  another,  keeping  his  eyes  on  the 
page  for  a  half -hour,  while  his  mind  is  intently 
engaged  in  planning  a  business  venture,  analysing 
the  possible  meaning  of  a  neighbour's  obscure  re- 
mark, or  trying  to  decide  how  the  family  income 
may  be  pieced  out  to  meet  the  growing  needs  of  a 
growing  family.  The  undis eased  will  is  free  to 
choose  that  upon  which  it  shall  expend  its  force. 
In  fact,  the  very  term  "will,"  as  commonly  ac- 
cepted, signifies  freedom. 

Much  of  our  willing  is  practically  effortless, 
while  some  of  the  most  exhausting  of  human  ac- 
tivities are  found  in  the  intense  mental  concentra- 
tion of  conscious,  deliberate  determination.  Just 
as  the  heart  muscle  contracts  year  after  year  with 
no  consciousness  of  fatigue,  so  we  can  give  at- 
tention to  selfish  interests  and  personal  affairs  and 
pleasures  without  conscious  effort  of  will;  and 
many  a  character  fails  to  develop  recognisable 
force  or  perceptible  influence,  because  its  will  has 
never  turned  its  attention  from  what  might  al- 
most be  called  its  vegetative  functions.  The 
strongest  physique  may  be  rapidly  exhausted 
through  active  and  aggressive  muscular  exercise 
pitilessly  pushed,  and  in  the  course  of  a  few  hours 
physical  rest  becomes  imperative;  with  almost 
equal  rapidity  the  mind  wearies,  and  an  unques- 
tioned sense  of  exhaustion  becomes  manifest  when 
the  will  holds  attention  relentlessly  upon  some  dif- 


ILLS  AND  OUR  WILLS  161 

ficult  problem,  refusing  to  release  it  from  its  task 
until  it  has  reached  a  decision,  even  in  the  face  of 
perplexing  complexities.     In  the  power  or  weak- 
ness of  will  abides  the  strength  or  frailty  of  per- 
sonality, and  no  mental  quality  approximates  in 
value  that  of  a  highly  developed  power  of  active 
attention — an  attention  which  reaches  out  beyond 
narrow  and  selfish  and  personal  interests,  and  like 
the  patriarch  of  old,  wrestles  with  the  unknown, 
refusing  to  let  go  until  it  has  received  a  blessing. 
Genuine  will  power  is  only  developed  in  the  face 
of  conscious   effort.     No   situation  is   ever  pre- 
sented to  the  mind  which  is  not  capable  of  a  va- 
riety of  solutions.     One  of  these  will  be  over  a 
path  of  least  resistance,  the  easiest  way  out,  and 
the  easiest  way  is  usually  the  way  which  affords 
the  least  immediate  discomfort,  which  requires 
the  least  effort  at  the  time.     There  is  likewise  a 
path  of  greatest  resistance,  a  solution  which  de- 
mands present  sacrifices,  perchance  of  time,  of 
effort,  or  pride,  or  means,  but  which,  reason  and 
conscience  assert,  will  prove  ultimately  best  and 
right.     No  powerful  will  was  ever  developed  which 
did  not  deliberately  and  repeatedly  choose  the 
harder  path,  and  will  to  face  and  meet  and  over- 
come present  avoidable  difficulties.     True  will  is 
only  developed  through  the  habitual  meeting  of 
those  situations  which  require  the  expenditure  of 
conscious,  consistent  effort;  but  no  mental  habit 
pays  so  rich  a  return  upon  the  investment  made. 
The  habit  of  active  willing,  the  habit  of  meeting 
each  difficulty  squarely  and  resolutely,  now,  will 
gradually  become  automatic,  and  the  efforts  at- 


162        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

tendant  upon  decision,  resolution  and  persever- 
ance become  less  and  less  conscious,  as  the  growth 
of  the  power  to  do  becomes  more  and  more  in- 
herent. Herein  abides  the  secret  of  the  mastery 
of  masterful  lives.  And  to  the  master,  much 
which  the  weak  call  complex  is  simple,  and  more 
which  they  call  difficult  is  easy,  and  most  of  the 
burden  of  life's  problems  but  contributes  to  the 
joy  of  living. 

Endurance  finds  its  strength  in  will.  As  a 
type  of  humanity,  the  nervous  endure  poorly. 
Through  quickly  diverted  attention,  their  minds 
are  rapidly  attracted  and  held  by  small  discom- 
forts. The  writer  recalls  a  neurotic  patient  who, 
before  the  days  of  telephones,  sent  for  her  physi- 
cian after  midnight,  and  upon  his  arrival  pitifully 
asked  for  something  to  relieve  a  mosquito-bite! 
And  no  statistician  will  ever  compute  the  waste 
of  human  time  and  energy  lost  through  unneces- 
sary demands  of  easily  distracted,  weak-willed 
neurotics.  Slight  discomforts  through  inordinate 
attention  rapidly  grow  into  unbearable  distresses. 
Moderate  pains  become  "frightful";  the  heat  is 
"unbearable";  and  all  headaches  are  "perfectly 
agonising."  On  the  other  hand,  the  developed 
normal  will  is  capable  of  pushing  the  limit  of  hu- 
man endurance  far  beyond  the  power  of  most  of 
life's  discomforts  to  disturb.  With  what  genuine 
respect  the  normal  mind  contemplates  the  nobility 
of  highly-developed  superiority  to  suffering! 
With  what  reverence  we  think  of  Gladstone,  as, 
paralysed,  returning  to  Hawarden  from  a  health 
resort  and  being  carried  for  the  last  time  up  the 


ILLS  AND  OUR  WILLS  163 

steps  by  his  devoted  servants,  he  was  heard  pa- 
tiently murmuring,  "Why  cumbereth  I  the 
ground  ?"  No  whining  complaint,  no  weakling 's 
plea  for  sympathy  or  pity,  but  the  strong  soul's 
recognition  of  the  uselessness  of  its  worn-out 
body,  and  yearning  to  push  the  limits  of  endur- 
ance beyond  all  touch  of  time!  It  is  within  the 
power  of  each  earnest  life  to  slowly  but  surely 
push  further  and  further  away  that  impinging 
circle  of  irritations  and  discomforts  and  distress 
and  suffering,  and  what  we  call  trouble,  and  even 
the  pain  of  sorrow. 

The  emotions  of  the  nervous  are  keen,  active, 
eager  things,  ever  ready  to  entice  or  to  distress, 
always  eager  to  dominate  thought  selection,  teas- 
ing Beason,  wooing  Eeason,  blinding  Reason;  and 
Eeason  would  indeed  be  helpless  in  the  face  of  this 
coquette,  this  enchantress,  this  sometime  witch, 
were  it  not  for  the  support  of  Will.  Eeason  can 
command  intellect  to  select  objects  of  considera- 
tion more  constructive,  more  wholesome,  more 
righteous  than  those  which  instinct  and  its  emo- 
tions are  trying  to  force  to  the  front.  Through 
the  aid  of  will,  attention  may  be  fixed  upon  that 
which  is  practical,  strengthening  or  ennobling, 
and  herein  lies  the  basis  of  that  fundamental  and 
superb  quality  of  human  strength — self-control. 
Thoughts  involving  surrender  or  weakness  or  evil- 
doing,  if  allowed  to  occupy  the  attention  unre- 
strained, tend  sooner  or  later  to  result  in  dam- 
aging action.  Self-control  does  not  consist  in 
merely  holding  back  the  undesirable,  harmful  or 
weakening  thought,  but  in  the  summoning  of  a 


164       THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

wholesome  idea  into  the  field  of  consciousness  and 
a  resolute  attention  thereto.  Even  as  the  dam- 
aging thought  can  produce  harmful  action,  so  the 
habitually  represented  constructive  thought,  reso- 
lutely attended,  will  sooner  or  later  find  its  ex- 
pression in  beneficent  action,  for  action  is  the  end 
to  which  all  true  will  is  directed. 

The  physical  is  capable  of  attracting  the  mind 
through  so  large  a  variety  of  sensations,  the  mind 
itself  can  present  to  consciousness  so  comfortable 
a  stream  of  easy-going  diversions,  that  through 
the  long  years  of  character-development,  repeated 
will  effort  is  necessary  to  keep  the  higher  interests 
of  life  in  view.  Hence  the  wise  insistence  of  all 
great  religions  on  a  daily  period  of  serious  devo- 
tion. Feeling  is  capable  of  thrilling  man's  mind 
with  beauteous  sounds  of  harp  or  voice,  of  in- 
spiring his  thought  with  exquisite  touches  of 
beauty,  of  enchanting  his  imagination  with  prom- 
ises and  memories  until  he  fairly  dreams  himself 
into  bliss.  Intellect  weighs  the  worlds  in  its  bal- 
ance, estimates  the  attraction  power  of  unseen 
suns,  counts  the  microbes  upon  the  needle's  point, 
and  reduces  all  matter  to  its  atoms.  But  without 
will,  emotions  and  intellect  are  vain.  Man  must 
will,  not  merely  think  and  feel,  if  he  would  master 
himself — himself,  the  greatest  wonder  of  the  uni- 
verse. 

Enemies  of  the  Will. — So  superior  a  quality 
does  not,  could  not  exist  anywhere  without  at- 
tracting enemies — enemies  ever  eager  to  rob  it  of 
all  virtue,  to  win  its  very  strength  for  their  uses. 
Indolence  is  one  of  the  most  common  of  these,  in- 


ILLS  AND  OUE  WILLS  165 

dolence  finding  expression  in  many  forms.  The 
child  of  nature  surrenders  to  it  so  completely  as 
to  never  give  will  a  chance  for  development. 
Many  living  in  the  tropics  have  for  generations 
been  free  from  the  necessity  of  sustained  effort. 
Nature  has  ministered  to  their  comfort  through 
a  genial  climate,  an  abundance  of  self -reproducing 
foods,  and  in  the  absence  of  necessity  for  effort 
of  will,  sluggishness  and  shiftlessness  of  body  and 
mind  have  resulted.  These  undeveloped  children 
have  existed  through  the  ages,  and  are  to-day  less 
advanced  in  self-control  than  the  animals  of  their 
own  forests. 

Wealth,  plenty,  the  unwise  provisions  of  an- 
cestry, have  removed  from  the  lives  of  too  many 
the  necessity  for  special  effort  or  sacrifice;  and 
so,  in  the  midst  of  affluence  and  surrounded  by 
the  richest  of  opportunities,  many  will-less,  spine- 
less imitations  of  manhood  and  womanhood  de- 
velop. Absence  of  effort  means  absence  of  will, 
and  the  absence  of  will  too  frequently  makes  im- 
possible the  effort  directed  by  reason,  and  thus 
a  vicious  circle  may  be  established.  The  will-less 
ever  float  hither  and  thither  with  the  tide,  or 
down  the  stream,  but  are  never  seen  climbing  the 
Mountain  of  Difficulty.  Progress  and  develop- 
ment are  ever  products  of  will. 

We  have  already  noted  the  eternal  pull  of  the 
emotions,  which  persistently  strive  to  retain  their 
early  mastery  upon  the  life;  and  repeated  and 
keen  are  the  battles  between  desire  and  volition. 
Many  a  life  has  failed  of  success  because  of  the 
half -heart  edness  of  this  fight,  or  the  compromises 


166        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

which  have  been  made.  Surrender  to  fatigue  of 
body,  to  fatigue  of  mind  which  accepts  self-pity, 
soon  leads  to  easy  fatigue  of  will,  which,  when 
dominant,  becomes  quickly  assertive,  and  through 
fear  is  magnified  into  nervously  damaging 
exhaustions.  Indolence  accepts  fatigue  in  its 
numerous  varieties  as  an  excuse  for  inaction,  and 
inaction  soon  produces  physical  and  mental  toxins 
which  but  increase  fatigability — the  blight  of  so 
many  modern  lives.  There  is  a  will  of  inertia 
which  accepts  what  is,  rarely  making  any  effort 
to  displace  that  which,  introduced  by  suggestion 
or  feeling,  occupies  the  focus  of  attention;  a  will 
which  slips  languidly  from  one  thought  to  another 
— the  will  of  the  inconsequential  mental  weakling. 
The  mind  of  the  dreamer,  while  mentally  more 
constructive  than  that  of  the  drifter,  usually  pro- 
duces a  will  equally  friable.  The  dreamer  may 
picture  and  construct  and  decide  never  so  beau- 
tifully, but  in  his  very  inaction,  in  his  failure  to 
put  his  decisions  into  practice,  flabbiness  of  will 
is  assured. 

Indecision,  another  enemy  of  the  will,  while 
usually  found  in  those  of  poorly  developed 
intellects  or  of  weak  characters,  may  exist  in 
otherwise  quite  fine  types  of  personality.  Will  is 
not  only  an  aggressive  and  productive  force,  but 
has  a  restraining  or  so-called  inhibitive  power, 
and  in  indecision  these  two  qualities  become 
arrayed,  one  against  the  other.  For  the  moment 
the  positive  expression  of  volition  says,  "I  will," 
but  immediately  questions  arise  as  to  the  wisdom 
and  expediency,  or  the  Tightness,  or  the  propriety 


ILLS  AND  OUR  WILLS  167 

of  the  act,  and  inhibition  says,  "I  must  not." 
What  an  exhausting  battle  it  is !  How  much  of 
humanity's  vital  force  and  power  has  been  wasted 
in  these  internal  conflicts  of  the  "I  must  not" 
contending  with  the  "I  will!"  Could  intellect 
but  select  wisely  and  present  for  the  will's  affirma- 
tion or  rejection  only  such  proposals  as  would 
stimulate  immediate  and  decided  action,  and  could 
our  decisions  remain  eternally  fixed,  unless  added 
knowledge  should  give  reason  for  reconsideration, 
how  much  more  advanced  in  all  that  stands  for 
mastery  and  power  and  character  would  civilisa- 
tion be!  But  eager  and  burning  desire  and 
yearning,  seductive  appetites  and  stubborn,  hard- 
hearted rebellion,  do  not  so  easily  down.  And 
the  fight  goes  on — that  life-long  fight  on  will's 
battlefield. 

Many  of  the  conscientious  nervous  are  assailed 
with  doubts,  doubts  which  they  have  not  the  will- 
strength  to  check.  Reason  may  repeatedly  reveal 
the  solution  of  their  questioning,  but  fear,  that 
parasite  which  many  have  allowed  to  grow 
stronger  than  will,  out-argues  reason;  and  when 
such  fear  is  entrenched  within  our  natures,  it 
delights  in  tantalising  us  with  the  doubting  folly. 
And  what  a  hectoring  troupe  of  miserably  insist- 
ent ideas,  doubt  forces  into  the  field  of  our 
consciousness!  Doubt  romps  riotously  over  all 
which  is  sacred  and  comforting  in  our  minds; 
doubt  questions  the  wisdom  of  our  decisions,  the 
purity  of  our  thoughts,  the  sincerity  of  our  acts, 
the  truths  of  our  religion,  our  possibility  of  salva- 
tion; doubt  suggests  the  certainty  of  damnation, 


168        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

the  helplessness  in  our  fight  for  good ;  doubt  enters 
into  our  most  sacred  reading  to  suggest  disquiet- 
ing interpretations,  and  taunt  with  the  hopeless- 
ness of  our  "  unpardonable  sins ;"  doubt  magnifies 
life's  inevitable  mistakes  into  irrevocable,  soul- 
shriveling  acts.  Doubt  may  attack  the  character 
of  friend  or  wife  and  rob  us  of  our  faith  in  human 
nature,  or  doubt  inverted  may  make  us  wretchedly 
conscious  of  the  same  questioning  attitude  toward 
us  in  the  minds  of  those  we  meet.  We  doubt  our 
own  hearts,  our  own  minds,  our  own  souls.  The 
doubter  takes  counsel  here,  there  and  yonder,  and 
if  ill,  the  influence  of  his  physician's  advice  hardly 
remains  with  him  till  the  first  prescription  has 
been  filled,  and  indecision  robs  him  of  ability 
to  put  into  operation  the  very  counsel  which 
would  lead  him  away  from  his  paralysing  weak- 
nesses. Doubt  is  the  great  divider  of  the  mind's 
energies,  the  thief  of  that  strength  which  abides 
in  decision,  even  its  decisions  of  error.  Doubt 
is  at  the  foundation  of  vacillating  lives.  The 
unstable,  changeable  nature  may  be  due  to  the 
superficial  emotional  control  of  impulse;  but  in- 
decision, with  its  "yea"  to-day  and  to-morrow 
"nay,"  finds  not  the  peace  or  rest  of  stability. 
Vacillation  hastens  the  shopper  home  to  counter- 
mand the  delivery  of  goods  just  ordered;  vacilla- 
tion is  the  basis  of  those  depreciated  lives  whose 
rudderless  minds  are  restlessly  tossed  about  on 
the  sea  of  life. 

The  so-called  comfortable  and  well-to-do  classes 
have  few  demands  made  upon  them  to-day  for 
real  self-denial.  Man  has  so  harnessed  the 


ILLS  AND  OUR  WILLS  169 

powers  of  Nature  as  to  convert  the  mountain 
torrent,  the  lightning  power,  the  stored-up  fuel 
of  the  ages,  into  tireless,  unquestioning  servants. 
Steam,  gasoline  and  electricity  carry  his  messages, 
do  his  errands,  haul  his  commerce  and  flit  him 
hither  and  thither,  almost  with  the  speed  of  his 
own  wishes.  Gas  ranges,  electric  elevators,  steam 
dishwashers,  public  laundries,  commercial  bak- 
eries and  shops  provided  with  goods  from  all 
lands,  the  check-book  and  fountain-pen,  and  the 
ever-willing  auto  at  the  door,  have  taken  from 
domestic  life  veritable  mountains  of  effort.  Yet, 
not  satisfied  with  the  removal  of  much  drudgery 
that  a  generation  ago  accepted  as  essential,  we 
are  to-day  exercising  wit  and  ingenuity  to  avoid 
even  the  semblance  of  possible  discomfort. 
Self-indulgence  looms  larger  and  larger  into 
latter-day  living  as  an  enemy  of  the  will.  The 
enervating  process  begins  early.  The  ills  -of 
childhood  are  coddled  with  an  assiduity  which 
would  merit  the  development  of  some  funda- 
mental virtue,  rather  than  the  inculcation  of  a 
character-disintegrating  habit.  Youth,  departing 
from  its  ancient  pride,  pales  with  every  pain, 
wilts  at  the  touch  of  weariness,  is  frequently  abed, 
the  object  of  solicitude  and  medication,  through 
the  discomforts  of  gustatory  indulgences;  and 
maturity,  that  maturity  which  should  represent 
the  strength  of  manhood  and  the  patience  of 
womanhood,  fails  to  arrive.  Instead,  a  growing 
intolerance  of  all  that  discounts  coveted  ease,  a 
rabid  impatience  under  the  smart  of  even  deserved 
pain,  and  repeated  surrender  to  frequently  re- 


170        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

curring  periods  of  exhaustion,  indicate  the  essen- 
tial frailty  of — yes,  the  practical  absence  of — 
wills  in  many  of  the  nervous. 

Surrender  to  weakness  of  body  and  depression 
of  spirit  is  a  seductive  error.  Self-pity,  that 
craven  mocker  of  self-respect,  frequently  forgets 
its  semblance  of  respectability,  and  covertly,  and 
later  obviously,  begs  in  the  very  highways  for 
the  mawkish  sympathy  that  could  only  satisfy 
the  sick  of  will.  Often  the  blight  of  self-indul- 
gences does  not  fall  so  heavily,  but  is  able  to 
forget  itself  the  while,  demanding  only  on  occasion 
unstinted  exercise  of  those  primal  passions  of 
anger  or  hate,  or  the  luxury  of  an  unf ought  fear. 
Many  have  the  stability  to  be  good  fair-weather 
companions,  but  with  the  first  sign  of  stress  or 
storm  let  loose  their  elemental  emotions,  and 
reveal  the  calm  of  the  preceding  days  as  a  super- 
ficial expression;  their  foundations  were  built  of 
riotous  uncertainty. 

Wilfulness,  a  treacherous  enemy  of  true  will, 
is  a  common  manifestation  found  in  the  selfish. 
With  the  ability  of  will  itself,  it  attends  and 
decides  and  holds  fast  to  its  own:  to  its  own 
weaknesses,  to  its  own  impulses — ever  and  anon 
to  its  own.  Wilfulness  can  set  its  face  as  adam- 
ant, and  with  eyes  of  steel  and  fist  of  mail,  resist 
the  appeals  of  need,  of  love,  of  reason,  or  of 
tenderness.  The  wilful  live  the  day,  the  year — 
sometimes  a  miserable,  hard  generation — of  re- 
bellious resistance  to  real  or  fancied  interferences 
with  their  conception  of  their  own  rights.  Indul- 
gence cries,  "I  want  what  I  want?  and  I  want  it 


ILLS  AND  OUR  WILLS  171 

now!"  and  Wilfulness  adds,  "And  I  will  have 
it ! ' '  Coy  Emotion  courts  Wilfulness,  who  laughs 
at  Eeason  and  mocks  Judgment,  and  never  lets 
an  opportunity  pass  to  discredit  true  Will,  its 
normal  master,  more  frequently  its  nominal  mas- 
ter— not  uncommonly  its  servile  slave.  Wilful- 
ness  accepts  Impatience  as  its  aid,  and  the  growth 
of  its  power  goes  hand  in  hand  with  the  loss  of 
self-restraint.  Every  purely  selfish  expression  of 
human  determination  and  resolution  marks  the 
growth  of  wilfulness  and  the  weakening  of  true 
volition. 

It  is  a  fundamental  truth  difficult  for  all  to 
learn,  one  which  the  cleverness  of  the  ages  has 
attempted  to  negate,  but  one  which  wisdom 
through  all  time  has  accepted,  that  good  of  body 
and  good  of  mind  and  good  of  soul  come  to  man 
through  conscious  and  consistent  effort.  And 
power  and  strength  grow  out  of  sacrifice,  and 
sacrifice  ever  indicates  a  surrender  of  ease.  The 
whole  story  of  human  and  personal  progress  is 
an  unmitigated  tale  of  denials  to-day — denials  of 
rest,  denials  of  repose,  and  comfort,  and  ease 
and  pleasure — that  to-morrow  may  be  richer.  A 
rationally  directed  will  is  the  force  which,  from 
the  emergence  into  prominence  of  the  first  super- 
man to  the  present  leaders  of  mankind,  has  been 
the  dominating  power  determining  his  progress. 
Strength  of  body  may  be  denied;  organic  weak- 
nesses which  skill,  nor  patience,  nor  effort  can 
overcome,  may  limit  physical  activities  and  make 
robustness  impossible ;  but  every  life  can  provide 
for  itself  the  opportunities  for  the  development 


172        THE  MASTEEY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

of  will-strength.  The  invalid  abed  can  as  reso- 
lutely attend  to  those  thoughts  which  are  self- 
disciplinary,  educative,  constructive,  as  the  athlete 
disporting  on  the  oval  green  before  the  applaud- 
ing thousands.  The  one  vital  mental  error  which 
no  delicacy  of  feeling,  nor  heights  of  erudition 
can  counter-balance,  is  the  failure  to  cultivate  the 
will. 

Wills  and  Our  Ills. — When  we  enter  into  a  full 
understanding  of  those  essential  laws  of  health 
which,  if  generally  observed,  would  make  swiftly 
and  positively  for  higher  standards  of  well-being, 
we  are  surprised  at  their  comparative  simplicity. 
Straight  indeed  is  the  way  of  health,  but  it  is 
narrow,  so  narrow  that  few  there  be  that  pass 
that  way.  There  are  frequent  by-paths  leading 
therefrom,  paths  that  meander  through  the  appar- 
ent coolness  and  shade  of  the  adjacent  wooded 
valleys,  where  the  murmur  of  the  rivulet,  the 
whistle  and  the  call  of  the  birds,  and  the  beauty 
and  scent  of  the  flowers  beckon  to  the  weary 
traveller  from  the  dusty,  ever-ascending,  shade- 
less,  straight  way;  and  Emotion  coaxes  Eeason, 
till  even  Eeason  at  times  counsels  Will  to  turn 
aside  and  rest,  to  turn  aside  and  indulge,  to  go 
his  own  sweet  way,  rather  than  to  follow  the 
highway.  It  takes  a  strong  will  to  live  true  to 
the  simple  laws  of  health,  in  the  face  of  the  tan- 
talisation  of  temptation. 

The  habit  of  discussing  our  feelings  is  grow- 
ing. The  finer  reserve  of  our  forefathers  in 
matters  as  personal  as  health  and  discomfort  is 
being  swept  away  to-day  by  the  willingness  of 


ILLS  AND  OUR  WILLS  173 

|  high  and  low  to  discuss  their  ills,  in  and  out  of 
season.     This  delicacy — a  strength  accepted  as  an 
unquestioned   standard   of   our  forefathers'   de- 
,  corum — is  being  lost  in  the  chorus  of  whines  and 
I  complaints,  swamped  in  the  eloquence  of  descrip- 
i  tion  of  selfish  ills,  submerged  in  that  dissonance 
of    sound,    the    "  confabulated "    expression    of 
modern  tales  of  woe.    And  ills  beget  ills,  and  dis- 
|  cussion  of  ills  suggests  more  ills,  and  with  the 
j  nervous,  particularly,   one 's  ills  infect  another, 
I  even  as  measles  is  passed  from  child  to  child. 
I  To  keep  our  ills  to  ourselves,  excepting  only  the 
privileged  ear  of  our  medical  or  spiritual  coun- 
i  selor,  stands  not  only  for  obvious  culture  and  a 
mark    of    refinement,    but,    in    these    days    of 
inveterate  gabble  about  personal  sensations,  in- 
dicates a  will  that  can  will. 

It  was  a  fortunate  day  for  the  world's  neurotics 
when  the  civilised  governments  decided  upon  con- 
certed action  to  limit  the  distribution  and  sale 
of  narcotic  drugs.  Oversensitiveness  to  all  stim- 
ulants makes  the  neurotic  a  poorly-resisting 
1  victim  to  the  allurements  of  drug-ease  and  the 
fascinations  of  drug  stimulation.  Coffee  fiends, 
dope  fiends,  cigarette  fiends,  narcomaniacs  of  all 
types,  are  recruited  chiefly  from  the  hereditary 
;  neurotics,  and  every  neurotic's  future  safety  is 
jeopardised  when  he  slips  off  the  bridle  of  self- 
control,  and  allows  drug-control,  either  stimulant 
i  or  sedative,  to  assume  temporary  mastery.  Alco- 
hol tempts  in  a  hundred  appealing  forms — 
appealing  to  palate,  through  social  customs, 
invading  medicines  under  the  term  of  "tonic" 


174        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

and  "digestants,"  appearing  under  the  guise  of 
"food" — appealing  to  taste,  to  pride,  to  fear  and 
to  apparent  need.  But  in  all  its  various  disguises 
it  is  only  alcohol — one  of  the  most  treacherous 
influences  which  can  be  introduced  into  the  life 
of  the  depressed  nervous.  With  its  temporary 
stimulative  action  it  brushes  away  the  lowering 
clouds,  and  with  its  secondary  narcotic  influence 
it  relieves  for  the  time  the  pain  of  dejection,  wip- 
ing out,  apparently,  the  sense  of  inadequacy  so 
common  to  this  type  of  the  ill ;  it  promises  a  quick 
and  happy  solution  of  those  moods  which  require 
so  much  strength  of  purpose -to  otherwise  combat. 
But  while  most  normal  men  and  a  few  normal 
women  can  indulge  in  the  artificial,  efficiency- 
reducing  comforts  of  alcohol  without  apparent 
hurt,  the  neurotic  pays  a  tremendous  price  for 
his  evanescent  relief.  Alcohol  gradually  robs 
him  of  even  his  defective  stability,  and  but 
increases  the  intensity  of  the  struggle  of  will  to 
hold  its  own.  This  and  more  can  be  said  of 
opium  and  all  its  various  combinations,  and  even 
still  more  concerning  the  rapidly  demoralising, 
mania-producing  cocaine. 

In  its  weakening  effect  on  the  will  exists  the 
most  potent  argument  against  the  cigarette. 
Practically  all  tobacco  users  admit  a  certain  sen- 
sory relief,  and  temporary  comfort  and  sensuous 
satisfaction  from  their  indulgence.  The  average 
man  smoking  two  or  three  times  a  day  probably 
suffers  little  for  his  half -hour  of  "solid  comfort," 
but  the  cigarette  smoker  is  rarely  one  with  the 
poised  resistance  to  limit  his  indulgences  to  two 


ILLS  AND  OUR  WILLS  175 

or  three  a  day.  As  a  rule  it  is  a  cigarette  and  a 
half-dozen  deep  inhalations  in  the  face  of  every 
irritation,  before  any  constructive  effort  is  made — 
an  artificial  adjustment  to  every  demand;  and  in 
;  his  frequently  recurring  cigarette  he  finds  a 
I  panacea  for  the  little  ills  and  discomforts  of  life, 
by  a  dependence  on  something  outside  of  him- 
self, a  resort  to  a  drug,  an  ignoring  of  the  rights 
of  will  to  determine,  to  decide,  and  to  do,  in  its 
I  own  strength.  Ultimately  the  temporary  comfort 
jof  the  oft-repeated  cigarette  fails  to  satisfy,  and 
I  when  a  stronger  test  of  resistance  comes  there 
is  no  will  to  face  its  demands,  and  alcohol,  or 
[even  a  more  powerful  drug,  is  resorted  to  for  the 
!  sense  of  strength  needed  in  the  absence  of  an 
assertive  will.  This  same-  volitional  defect  ex- 
plains the  frequent  trips  to  the  soda-fountain  for 
glasses  of  "dope,"  the  " pick-me-up "  of  afternoon 
tea  or  extra  strong  coffee,  the  "eye-opener"  to 
make  a  honeycombed  disposition  respectable  for 
'the  breakfast  table,  the  "nightcap"  to  make 
possible  quick  self-forgetfulness  in  sleep.  Thus 
'wills  are  being  displaced  by  drugs,  character  by 
dope,  and  wilfulness  and  our  ills  develop  hand 
jin  hand. 

Erroneous  thinking  may  disturb  health  through 
the  wrong  selection  of  ideas;  emotional  discord 
'may  destroy  the  peace  and  quietude  of  our  feeling- 
life  so  essential  to  well-being,  but  absence  of 
stability  through  lack  of  wills  able  to  will,  means 
;the  wasteful  drifting  of  doubt  and  indecision — 
means  too  often  the  nervous  wreckage  of  inertia, 
cowardly  surrender  or  unholy  wilfulness. 


CHAPTER  XIV 
CLEAR  THINKING 

The  Interwoven  Mind. — In  our  study  of  human- 
ity's nervous  needs,  we  have  already  realised  that 
the  complex  nature  of  man  may  he  likened  to  a 
group  of  notes,  capable  of  producing  either  a  full, 
rich,  harmonious  chord,  or  a  jangling  discord — 
if  even  one  note  is  imperfect,  the  harmony  is 
broken.  Man's  composite  elements  are  so  inter- 
related and  interdependent  as  to  constitute  a 
practical  unit,  a  principle  which  becomes  most 
emphatic  when  his  mental  qualities  are  considered. 
For  convenience  we  study  his  intellectual,  emo- 
tional and  volitional  needs,  but  the  unity  of  his 
mind  must  ever  be  clear — the  influence  and 
dependence  of  each  of  these  qualities  upon  the 
others  being  fundamental  ones. 

Since  the  dawn  of  nervousness,  the  majority  of 
cures  of  this  disorder  have  been  effected  through 
the  emotional  nature  by  means  of  suggestion. 
Charms  and  incantations,  the  powerful  influence 
of  reputed  sacred  relics,  the  force  of  personality 
of  the  medicine  man,  priest  or  physician,  the  very 
price  paid  for,  or  energy  expended,  in  carrying 
out  extensive  pilgrimages  or  elaborate  treatments 
— these  and  innumerable  other  influences  have 
entered  the  mind  through  suggestion  to  displace 

176 


CLEAR  THINKING  177 

ideas  of  disease  with  those  of  health.  But  in  this 
day  of  increasing  accuracy  and  discrimination  of 
knowledge,  the  uncertainties  of  mere  irrational, 
emotional  displacement  are  rapidly  being  rele- 
gated to  the  use  of  the  ignorant,  the  self -deceived, 
or  to  mercenary  impostors.  Accurate  thinking, 

!  the  substitution  of  facts  for  error  and  of  reason 

j  for  feeling,  forms  a  soil  in  which  nervous  stability 

ican  grow  and  bring  forth  abundant  fruit.  In 
the  preceding  three  chapters  we  have  seen  how 

[many  mental  influences  play  active  parts  in  pro- 
ducing the  distressing  symptoms  of  nervousness. 
Few  have  suffered  from  ithis  disorder  who  are  not 

jin  need  of  more  or  less  extensive,  wholesome 
mental  readjustment.  Many  generations  of  prog- 

i  ress  will  elapse  before  the  inherently  suggestible 
— those  ever  difficult  to  influence  through  reason — 
will  be  displaced  by  others  capable  of  logical 
mastery  of  their  weaknesses.  But  the  only  sound 

.  and  abiding  basis  for  cure  of  nervousness  exists 
in  rational  reeducation.  Just  as  definitely  as 
skilled  intelligence  is  necessary  to  decide  the 

'dosage  and  hour  of  giving  diphtheria  antitoxin 
to  cut  short  an  attack  of  that  dread  disease^  as 
certainly,  though  less  dramatically  rapid,  un- 
fortunately, is  there  a  relation  between  intelli- 
gence and  the  cure  of  nervousness;  and  clear 
thinking  is  the  beginning  of  intelligence. 

Thought  Selection. — Our  thoughts  drift  through 
the  early  years  of  consciousness  so  simply,  so 

(naturally,  so  inconsequentially,  that  we  may  be 
quite  grown  before  we  realise  their  import,  their 
fundamental  seriousness,  their  tremendous  sig- 


178        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

nificance;  and  drift  they  do,  until  we  attend  and 
select.  As  we  have  seen,  attention  is  the  will's 
regal  power,  and  selection  the  intellect's  unques- 
tioned supremacy.  There  are  few  minds  which  do 
not  need  to  give  thoughtful  consideration  to  a 
more  active  selection  of  their  mental  content.  So 
easy  it  is,  apparently  so  natural,  to  be  passive  in 
this,  and  to  allow  the  thoughts  to  chase  one  an- 
other, a  sportive,  motley,  unmarshalled  procession. 
Too  frequently  all  serious  thinking  or  objective 
thinking  comes  as  a  burden,  and  the  happy-go- 
lucky  thought  life  is  reverted  to,  the  moment  relief 
from  the  pressure  of  necessity  removes  the  task 
of  active  thought  selection.  At  all  times  we  are 
choosing  our  thought  life.  We  passively  choose 
when  we  attend  to  that  which  enters  our  mind, 
the  suggestion  of  occasion,  whether  relevant  or 
irrelevant  to  our  mental  needs  or  the  soul's  wel- 
fare. We  actively  choose  when  we  dwell  upon 
that  which  instructs  and  constructs,  that  which 
stands  for  growth,  that  which  reason  can  pass  and 
commend.  Just  as  physical  indolence  may  be- 
come an  exhaustion-claiming  habit,  so  passive 
thinking  may  excuse  itself  and  resist  the  intro- 
duction of  active,  objective  thought  habits  on  the 
basis  of  undue  fatigue. 

The  question  of  interest  plays  a  vital  part  in 
influencing  thought  habit.  In  the  passive  or  un- 
trained mind,  sustained  attention  is  the  product 
of  interest,  the  mind  lending  itself  briefly  and 
but  weakly  to  any  thought  not  associated  with 
interest;  and  as  the  number  of  interests  is  often 
pitiably  limited,  or  but  shallow  or  inconsequential, 


CLEAR  THINKING  179 

the  mind  finds  little  to  feed  upon  through  the 
multiplying  days  of  a  life-time,  but  self  and  the 
superficial.  Not  so  with  a  mind  that  has  attained 
maturity,  for  it  finds  an  ever-increasing  ability 
to  stimulate  interest  through  attention.  The  mind 
which  has  actively  and  determinedly  formed  the 
habit  of  thought  selection,  finds  an  early  and 
growing  reward  in  the  multiplication  of  its  inter- 
ests, in  its  capacity  for  quick-forming  interests, 
and  in  its  wonderful  ability  to  find  novel  and 
attractive  associations  of  the  new  with  the  old. 
And  so  by  consistent  development  of  the  habit 
of  active  selection,  the  stream  of  thought,  that 
marvellous,  unending  trooping  of  ideas  across  the 
stage  of  consciousness,  may  become  more  and 
more  subject  to  control;  and  gradually  this  ob- 
jectionable character,  that  distasteful,  disturbing, 
disfiguring  thought  personage,  may  be  eliminated, 
displaced  by  others  bearing  strength,  calm  and 
competence — constructive,  healing  thoughts. 

It  is  a  law  of  our  consciousness  that  it  must 
have  an  object,  but  consciousness  itself  seems 
quite  indifferent  as  to  the  character  of  the  thought 
shoved  into  the  limelight  of  the  moment.  All  it 
demands  is  something  to  look  at,  to  talk  about, 
to  remark  upon.  It  remains  for  the  intellect  to 
protect  consciousness  from  years  of  wasteful 
attention  by  selecting  that  which  is  wholesome 
and  productive,  and  which  contributes  to  mental 
growth.  Consciousness  is  very  apt  to  respond  to 
the  promptings  of  wish  and  desire,  and  to  un- 
profitably  fritter  away  the  mind's  time  and 
energies,  paddling  about  the  great  sea  of  impossi- 


180        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

bility.  Much  of  the  will's  energy  is  wasted  in 
controlling  desires  and  impulses — a  waste  quite 
unnecessary  did  the  mind  select  more  carefully 
its  thought  contents.  Thought  selection  can  hem 
in  and  limit  and  displace  desire.  The  mind  of 
developed  active  selection  can  quickly  crowd 
extravagant  and  unprofitable  impulse  into  the 
background,  and  relieve  will  of  damaging,  tan- 
talising conflict. 

A  vital  element  in  the  training  of  active  selec- 
tion is  the  development  of  thought  rejection. 
Memory  is  the  natural  product  of  attention,  the 
average  poor  memory  being  usually  but  an  evi- 
dence of  defective  clear  thinking  at  the  moment 
of  new  thought  introduction.  But  most  that 
enters  the  mind  in  these  days  of  voluminous 
attractions  should  be  forgotten,  must  be  forgotten, 
for  the  sake  of  clearness  of  those  thoughts  which 
are  to  be  treasured  for  future  use.  The  art  of 
forgetting  may  be  promoted  until  all  which  is 
irrelevant  to  reality,  and  the  needs  and  uses  of 
the  individual  life,  is  dismissed.  Every  pro- 
gressive business  or  professional  man  has  in  his 
desk  appropriate  drawers  and  pigeonholes  in 
which  are  filed  classified  groups  of  documents, 
accounts,  pamphlets,  catalogues  and  other  useful 
papers.  Watch  the  trained,  systematic  man  as  he 
rapidly  opens  his  daily  mail  and  sorts  its  con- 
tents. If  not  accustomed  to  such  methods,  you 
will  be  surprised,  probably  dismayed,  at  the 
amount  of  material  that  never  finds  an  abiding 
place  in  drawer,  pigeonhole  or  classified  assort- 
ment, but  is  consigned  to  the  waste-basket.  In 


CLEAR  THINKING  181 

response  to  your  question,  he  will  probably  reply 
with  a  serious  smile  that  his  waste-basket  is  the 
most  valuable  piece  of  furniture  in  his  office. 
Were  it  not  for  that,  a  few  weeks  would  find  the 
room,  now  the  acme  of  order,  piled  ceiling  high 
and  uninhabitable  because  of  the  accumulated 
mass  of  useless  trash.  So  it  is  with  a  mind  which 
has  not  attained  the  power  of  rejection,  has  not 
developed  active  and  aggressive  forgetfulness. 
Attention  never  accumulates  strength,  unless, 
aided  by  wise  selection,  it  has  developed  a  gen- 
eralised power  of  inattention.  Only  one  subject 
at  a  time  can  be  given  clear  thought,  and  lacking 
selective  attention,  many  a  mind  is  a  perfect 
hodge-podge  of  chaotic  jumble,  half  attending, 
half  knowing — a  confusing  clutter  of  material, 
with  thought-clearness  obscured  and  well-nigh 
impossible.  There  can  be  no  growth  of  construc- 
tive selection  which  does  not  involve  an  equally 
active  increase  in  the  ability  to  ignore,  to  skip 
and  to  forget. 

Much  of  the  jumble  of  hazy,  confused  thought 
life,  so  common  and  so  detrimental  to  that  mental 
clearness  which  stands  strongly  for  mental  sound- 
ness, is  due  to  a  crowding  of  the  mind  as  a  care- 
less eater  crowds  his  stomach.  Quantity,  not 
discriminated  quality,  is  poured  in  without  con- 
sideration of  the  system's  needs — unmasticated, 
bolted.  The  clearing  of  much  mental  confusion 
and  the  breaking  up  of  damaging  mental  habits 
is  within  the  power,  if  seriously  attempted,  of 
every  individual  possessing  a  mind  of  average 
ability.  The  determination  to  insist  daily  upon 


182        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

the  clearing  up  of  some  subject  of  recognised  half- 
knowledge  or  of  obscurity,  to  daily  think  out  in  its 
fulness  some  one  simple  idea;  and  the  formation 
of  the  habit  of  cultivating  our  power  of  rejection 
by  promptly  and  definitely  slipping  a  profitable 
thought  in  place  of  a  wasteful  one,  are  forms  of 
exercise  as  valuable  to  our  mental  health  as  are 
deep  breathing  and  spread-eagles  to  the  physical. 
Even  as  the  daily  forcing  of  our  muscles  to  do 
sufficient  honest  work  to  rid  the  system  of  its 
poisons,  requires,  and  indeed  develops,  a  certain 
moral  force,  so  our  training  in  thought  selection 
and  thought  substitution  requires  genuine  honesty 
of  purpose. 

In  these  simple  suggestions  lies  the  foundation 
of  our  mental  readjustment.  Few  lives  are  so 
devoid  of  interest,  and  none  so  astute  in  erudition, 
but  can  find  an  inexhaustible  supply  of  material 
available  to  cultivate  clear  thinking  habits.  Clear 
thinking,  like  charity,  should  begin  at  home,  and 
a  thousand  practical  openings  are  at  hand.  Our 
speech,  that  superb  medium  of  thought  communi- 
cation, offers  almost  inexhaustible  opportunities 
for  acquiring  habits  of  accuracy  and  improved 
selection.  Most  of  us  would  be  astonished  if  we 
were  shown  how  many  words  in  common  use  we 
mispronounce,  and  how  many  more  we  fail  to 
apply  advantageously.  Attention  to  the  speech 
of  our  friends,  not  with  criticism,  but  with  the 
sole  object  of  suggestive  comparison,  will  disclose 
constant  opportunities  for  acquiring  accuracy  and 
selective  nicety.  The  guidance  of  five  careful  min- 
utes daily,  at  the  dictionary,  proves  ultimately  a 


CLEAR  THINKING  183 

large  economy.  And,  as  we  shall  later  find,  accur- 
acy of  expression  breeds  accuracy  of  thought  and 
feeling.  Hardly  a  page  is  read  but  contains  some 
word,  some  reference,  some  name,  involved  for  us 
in  more  or  less  obscurity;  so  much  of  what  we 
see  and  even  handle  and  use  is  but  superficially 
understood,  and  has  for  years  been  lazily  and 
hazily  thought.  There  is  no  one  who  cannot  profit 
by  a  consistent,  systematic  clearing  up  of  his  own 
mental  obscurities,  and  each  thread  pulled  out  of 
the  tangle  is  that  much  more  material  to  be  de- 
voted to  future  practical  use. 

The  advice  of  daily  thinking  out  some  thought 
in  its  fulness  can,  of  course,  be  followed  only  in 
a  relative  way.  There  is  a  relatedness  of  all 
thought  which  makes  an  endless  chain,  provided 
we  had  all  the  links.  But  an  earnest  clearing  up 
of  some  thought  which  we  recognise  as  confused, 
or  setting  aside  of  others  lacking  practical  solu- 
tion, with  a  willingness  to  alter  earlier  prejudices, 
decisions  or  opinions,  will  rarely  fail  to  secure  for 
us  more  light,  and  to  provide  more  satisfactory 
grounds  for  our  conclusions.  Perseverance  in 
this  habit  of  calm  daily  analysis  of  some  question 
or  problem  or  situation  will  in  a  year  produce 
remarkable  results — only,  however,  if  in  honesty 
and  fairness  we  determine  to  put  aside  every  ele- 
ment which  does  not  appeal  to  us  as  being  abso- 
lutely truthful. 

So  many  of  the  nervous  are  made  wretched  by 
thoughts  they  cannot  down,  all  because  in  their 
early  training  they  failed  to  develop  that  power 
given  the  normal  mind  to  promptly  eliminate  the 


184       THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

harmful,  to  replace  the  irritating  with  the  sooth- 
ing, the  harassing  by  the  strengthening,  the  tempt- 
ing by  the  mastering.  As  we  develop  the  philoso- 
pher's power  to  select  and  attend  only  to  the 
best,  we  develop  the  ability  to  bring  life  to  our 
own  terms,  and  to  laugh  at  its  threats. 

Eliminating  Mental  Error. — All  progress  is 
based  upon  the  displacement  of  error  by  truth, 
and  again,  so  far  as  our  present  existence  is  con- 
cerned, truth  and  error  are  but  relative.  We  can- 
not know  either  of  them  as  absolute.  The  better 
the  mind,  the  more  fully  it  recognises  its  own 
tendency  to  erroneous  thoughts,  and  the  more  one 
develops,  the  more  conscious  he  becomes  of  the 
inaccuracy  of  much  of  his  thinking.  Substituting 
sentiment,  or  more  often  sentimentality,  for 
reality,  mixing  fancy  with  fact  and  the  unprov- 
able  idealistic  with  ideas,  many  accept  error  and 
neglect  the  formation  of  elemental  but  funda- 
mental habits  of  thought  life.  But  other  minds 
have  surrendered  absolutely  to  misthinking,  and 
accept  grossly  perverted  habits  of  thought  as  nor- 
mal, or  unavoidable,  or  irremediable.  Through 
false  pride,  mental  indolence  or  uncombated  nar- 
rowness, they  have  failed  to  cultivate  the  critical, 
that  sense  of  finer  discrimination  between  truth 
and  error,  between  right  and  wrong,  between 
selfishness  and  unselfishness,  between  strength 
and  weakness,  between  feeling  and  reason.  Such 
minds  not  only  remain  incapable  of  selecting  and 
accepting  and  utilising  the  constructive  facts  of 
daily  life,  but  frequently  become  so  perverted  as 
to  foolishly  deny  these  very  facts,  and  vainly 


CLEAR  THINKING  185 

attempting  to  substitute  warped,  self-interested 
opinions,  go  pitifully  through  losing  years,  in- 
sistent upon  the  Tightness  of  their  errors.  Like 
the  deluded  ostrich,  thinking  to  find  safety  by 
hiding  his  head  in  a  hole,  their  denial  of  reality 
is  robbing  them  of  their  capacity  for  true  enjoy- 
ment and  genuine  happiness,  is  weakening  and 
disintegrating  their  ability;  and  may  sour  and 
embitter  their  personalities,  and  even  warp  and 
narrow  their  characters. 

Persistent  difficulty  will  be  found  in  the  mind 
which  has  allowed  itself  to  entertain  prejudice,  in 
displacing  this  defective  form  of  judgment  with 
that  based  upon  reason.  Few  mental  habits  so 
quickly  obscure  the  clear  light  of  truth,  so  quickly 
shut  the  doors  and  windows  and  draw  the  shades 
of  the  mind's  understanding,  as  do  prejudices 
introduced  into  early  training.  Many  of  the 
nervous  find  it  difficult,  if  not  impossible,  to  dispel 
their  belief  in  their  own  "  inherited "  deficiencies 
and  disorders,  when  in  truth  very  much  of  what 
the  neurotic  blames  upon  ancestry  is  simply  a 
warped  mass  of  harmful  ideas  taught  him  in  his 
youth,  or  opinions  gathered  from  ignorant 
sources,  which  go  on  year  after  year,  limiting  and 
hurting.  The  practical  inability  of  the  Jew  to 
fairly  criticise  Judaism,  or  the  Christian,  Chris- 
tianity, or  the  Japanese,  Shintoism,  while  quite 
capable  of  reasoning  without  undue  emotion  upon 
the  arguments  for  and  against  the  marvels  in  re- 
ligions not  their  own,  illustrates  the  common 
difficulty  of  all  to  discredit  early  religious  influ- 
ences. But  for  him  who  would  attain  mental 


186        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

supremacy,  a  willingness  must  come  to  relentlessly 
hunt  out  error — to  pursue  it  endlessly — which 
determination,  resolutely  undertaken  and  con- 
sistently maintained,  gradually  reveals  truth. 
Again  pride,  and  always  prejudice,  satisfactory 
conclusions — ofttimes  our  most  comfortable  rest- 
ing-places of  thought — opinions  which  we  have 
uttered  in  the  conceit  of  confidence,  unfounded 
faiths  and  vain  hopes,  must  be  ousted  and  replaced 
by  the  stranger,  Truth.  Perchance  the  oppor- 
tunity does  not  come  daily  to  rectify  error,  but 
if  the  resolution  is  resolute  that  we  will  never 
allow  conscious  error  to  remain  unmolested,  we 
are  using  building  material  only  comparable  to 
structural  steel,  concrete  and  granite. 

Recognising  Reality. — If  the  neurotic  would 
mend  the  error  of  his  mental  ways,  he  will  early 
learn  that  extravagance  of  speech  stands  for  dis- 
tortion of  thought ;  that  clear,  logical  thinking  is 
hurt  by  inordinate  expression — and  he  will  rapidly 
eliminate  his  superlatives  and  many  of  his  com- 
paratives. "Beastly  weather, "  "insufferably 
hot,"  "horrible  pains, "  "unutterable  bores," 
"nights  without  a  wink  of  sleep,"  "splitting  head- 
aches, "  "  offensive  presences, "  the  "  worst-evers, ' ' 
and  the  whole  vocabulary  of  inaccuracy — an  in- 
accuracy which  has  long  since  lost  even  the  charm 
of  increased  vividness — must  give  way  to  tem- 
perance and  fairness  and  honesty  in  description. 
The  one  who  habitually  defaces  reality  by  ex- 
tremes of  expression,  if  not  already  nervous,  is 
travelling  nervousward. 

Many  neurotics  early  discredit  habits  of  sav- 


CLEAR  THINKING  187 

ing  reality.  They  devote  their  thought  life  to  the 
stimulation  of  feeling  rather  than  in  the  direction 
of  doing.  In  what  glorious  sprees  of  emotional 
intoxication,  ranging  from  surrender  to  depres- 
sions as  absolute  as  gutter  drunkenness,  to  the 
glorious  revels  of  intense,  overwrought  excit- 
ability do  they  indulge !  In  such  lives  the  veriest 
trifling  acts  are  accompanied  by  a  perfect  furore 
of  emotions.  Blazing  eyes,  flushed  face,  high- 
keyed  volubility,  eager  restlessness,  mark  the 
catching  of  the  street-car  or  the  ordering  of  a 
glass  of  soda — energy  fairly  ' l  slopping  out, ' '  and 
producing  little  but  froth  and  noise.  The  same 
force  wisely  directed  toward  constructive  reality 
would  turn  these  emotional  spendthrifts  into  the 
very  salt  of  the  earth.  Such  useless  waste  of 
energy  could  wash  dishes,  and  make  dresses,  and 
write  books,  and  teach  kindergarten,  and  speed 
the  typewriter,  with  a  vengeance,  were  the  use- 
less force  transferred  to  practical  ends. 

We  are  too  prone  to  begin  our  improvements 
at  the  top.  We  should  begin  clear  thinking  at  the 
bottom.  It  should  be  associated  with  our  daily 
doing.  We  shall  not  succeed  so  well  by  an  effort 
to  reform  the  process  of  thought  itself,  as  by  the 
lucid  association  of  thought  with  act.  There  is 
no  act  too  trivial  to  be  preceded  by,  or  associated 
with,  clear  thinking,  certainly  not  until  the  possi- 
bility of  error  and  haziness  be  eliminated  from 
that  act,  and  the  automatic  produce  a  perfect  sub- 
stitute. The  all-saving  habit  of  clearing  our 
thoughts  from  error  is  possible  only  when  we 
begin  with  the  practical  facts  associated  with  our 


188        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

daily  doing.  The  mother  who  does  not  acquaint 
herself  with  the  simple  elements  of  the  chemistry 
of  foods  and  of  cooking,  is  sowing  the  seeds  of 
future  digestive  weaknesses  in  the  bodies  of  her 
children,  while  she  herself  is  blindly  "  improving 
her  mind, ' '  preparing  papers  on  the  Abstractions 
of  Kant,  or  attempting  to  pen  rhapsodies  upon 
Grieg 's  concertos.  She  is  shutting  her  eyes  to 
the  presence  of  damaging  error,  and  substituting 
sentimental  fancy  for  solid  facts.  The  clerk 
who,  day  after  day,  ignorantly  handles  goods, 
knowing  not  their  material,  their  origin,  their 
comparative  values;  who,  touching  humanity 
hourly,  is  learning  nothing  of  the  character,  the 
tendencies,  the  courtesies,  the  weaknesses  of  hu- 
man nature,  passively  dreaming  the  while  of  the 
Saturday  nights  at  the  theatre  and  the  Sundays 
of  coveted  idleness,  is  a  thief.  He  is  robbing 
himself  of  breadth,  and  the  basis  of  progress, 
closing  his  eyes  to  a  world  of  attractive  and  prac- 
tical interests;  he  is  robbing  not  only  himself, 
but  his  employer  and  his  patrons,  through  his 
failure  to  enlarge  reality.  The  servant  who  treats 
all  her  pots  and  pans  and  kettles  without  dis- 
crimination, who  knows  not  copper  nor  aluminum, 
nor  cast-iron,  nor  enamel,  to  whom  china  and 
iron-stone  alike  are  "  dishes, "  and  who  scrubs 
and  rubs  the  hours  out,  thoughtless  and  non- 
thinking, is  truly  a  servile  servant,  and  will  so 
remain. 

The  failure  to  apply  clear  thinking,  the  failure 
to  demand  an  understanding,  the  failure  to  con- 
centrate upon  and  master  the  elements  of  daily 


CLEAR  THINKING  189 

contact,  constitute  the  swaying,  uncertain  foun- 
dation of  many  a  neurotic's  mind,  and  such  was 
the  mind  of  "The  Girl  Who  Got  Battled."    Left 
alone  for  a  short  time  through  the  necessity  of 
an  accident,  with  the  possibility  of  an  attack  from 
a  band  of  Indians,  she  was  given  a  loaded  revolver 
and  instructed,  if  the  emergency  came,  to  use 
the  first  five  chambers  for  defence  and  if  not 
rescued,  the  last  one  for  herself.     The  Indians 
did  come,  but  upon  hearing  a  shot,  rapidly  de- 
parted.    The  girl  was  dead — the  girl  who  knew 
not  the  stability  of  daily  conscious  association 
with  reality.     She  had  used  the  first  shot,  instead 
of  the  last,  for  herself!    With  a  certainty  which 
is  mathematically  relentless,  the  mind  which  is 
daily  and  hourly  mixing  fantasy  with  fact,  will 
face  with  practical  helplessness  the  sudden  de- 
mands of  emergency — those  heartless  happenings 
which,  sooner  or  later,  enter  all  lives.     Habitual 
uncertainty  and  impracticability  of  thought  leave 
/   one  helpless  in  the  face  of  unexpected  demands 
I  which  force  reason  to  wrestle  with  facts,  unaided 
!  by  the  reserve  of  experience.    But  reason  so  re- 
|  inforced  is  capable  of  fearlessly  facing  the  unex- 
pected   and    the    inevitable    with    clearness    of 
I   perception,  which  makes  possible  the  practically 
I   automatic  use  of  every  opportunity  for  successful 
solution. 

Through  the  habit  of  familiarising  oneself  with 
the  materials  of  his  trade,  with  the  wares  of  his 
business,  with  the  elements  of  his  profession  or 
art;  of  steadfastly  refusing  to  dream  when  he 
can  know,  to  imagine  when  he  can  realise,  to  con- 


190        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

jecture  when  he  can  ascertain,  can  be  developed 
a  certainty  of  reality  which  will  rescue  many  of 
the  nervous  now  drifting  on  the  wings  of  fancy 
and  imagination,  the  puppets  of  the  elfish  children 
of  emotion. 

When  one  has  attained  the  ability  to  select 
thought,  and  developed  the  power  of  ignoring  the 
undesirable  idea,  has  eliminated  the  error  of  pre- 
judice and  can  clearly  distinguish  the  real  from 
the  false,  the  fixed  ideas  so  domineering  in  the 
life  of  the  neurotic,  are  impossible.  The  hurtful 
leadership  of  ignorant  or  erroneous  ideas,  of 
peculiarities  and  niceties  of  diet  and  habits  of 
dress,  and  general  crankiness,  will  reform  spon- 
taneously in  the  face  of  the  real;  for  truth  and 
reality  have  magnificent  powers  of  accumulation 
when  made  the  object  of  conscious  thought. 
And  when  the  intellect  has  had  some  months  of 
exercise  in  the  habits  of  clear  thinking,  worry 
thoughts  and  fear  thoughts,  and  even  milder  ob- 
sessions will  surrender,  in  the  presence  of  the 
facts  of  reality. 

Many  whose  minds  have  not  suffered  distortion 
from  the  surrender  to  fantasy  have  been  content 
with  too  narrow  margins  of  intelligence,  seeing 
only  the  visible  in  its  crudity,  their  contempla- 
tion being  limited  to  the  disappointments  and 
discriminations  of  the  past.  For  them  it  is  but 
a  short  step  from  their  narrow  field  of  thought 
to  haziness  and  obscurity.  With  science  popu- 
larised and  literature  prepared  in  a  thousand  at- 
tractive styles  and  as  many  helpful  forms,  with 
history  written  in  the  beauty  of  romance,  eager 


CLEAR  THINKING  191 

to  bring  the  facts  of  the  past  to  teach  us  lessons 
for  the  present  and  the  future,  too  many  are  con- 
itent  to  chatter  and  gossip,  to  find  fault  and  com- 
plain, to  discuss  the  weather,  to  talk  of  gowns, 
!to  waste  to-day,  to  narrow  life — knowing  in  part 
only,  comprehending  nothing  in  its  fulness,  ever 
:  willing  to  let  some  little  occurrence  of  life  obscure 
ithe  whole. 

Multiplying  Interests. — Few  modes  of  thought 
I  so  certainly  develop  the  nervous  life  as  that  which 
|  makes  the  selection  of  self -attention  and  self-cen- 
i  tred  interests  habitual.     The  suggestions  already 
;  given  will  be  found  most  useful  in  developing 
that    elemental   necessity — enlarged    and   varied 
;  interests.     Thoughts  about  self  must  give  way  to 
thoughts  above  self.     Trouble  and  illness,  suffer- 
ing and  sorrow  come  to  all,  and  few  conditions 
:  so  rivet  the  thought  upon  self  as  those  attendant 
!  upon  misfortune.     Self-pity  craves  the  balm  of  ex- 
pressed  sympathy.     Counsel  is  needed,  and  the 
sympathy  which  moves  us  on  to  manlier  effort, 
i  which  strengthens  patience  and  casts  resolution 
I  in  a  firmer  mould,  may  come  through  the  help  of 
others.    But  discussion  of  our  troubles  should  be 
rigorously  restricted  to  one  or  two  wise,  patient 
I  counsellors — our    physician,    our    attorney,    our 
minister,  as  professional  helpers,  or  that  one  fair- 
minded  friend,  either  in  or  out  of  the  family — 
|  and  then  silence.    In  theory  we  crave  strength 
j  and  force  and  charm  of  personality,  but  these 
!  cannot  be  until  there  is  strength  and  force  and 
charm  in  the  stream  of  thought  which  we  permit 
to    course   through    the   field    of   consciousness. 


192        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

Self-pitying  thoughts  can  but  produce  a  selfish 
personality,  limited  thinking  but  narrowness, 
coarse  thinking  but  repulsiveness,  inaccurate 
thinking  but  instability,  ignorant  thinking  but 
error.  To  cure  oneself  of  the  habit  of  self -atten- 
tion, the  psychological  law  of  the  substitution  of 
the  higher  thought  for  the  lower,  of  the  better 
for  the  meaner,  through  filling  the  mind  with  in- 
terests superior  to  self,  must  be  observed. 

Defective  mental  habits  are  almost  ubiquitous, 
but  the  opportunities  for  mental  readjustment  are 
rich  and  most  constant.  The  mind  ever  has  itself 
to  study,  and  it  becomes  largely  a  matter  of 
seriousness  of  purpose  as  to  whether  we  will 
clarify  our  thoughts  and  displace  the  erroneous, 
and  turn  away  from  self-attention;  for  with  the 
mind,  as  with  the  body,  the  power  of  the  will  to 
alter  habit  is  ever  existent.  Direct  paths  may 
be  as  quickly  worn  as  devious  ones ;  we  can 
capitalise  our  habits  and  make  our  methods 
friendly  and  peace-producing  and  strength-giving, 
rather  than  hostile  and  entangling  and  disinte- 
grating. The  habit  of  self-forgetfulness  is  as  pos- 
sible as  its  deformed  relative,  self-attention. 
Deliberate  thinking  and  the  insistence  upon 
accurate  thinking  may  become  as  automatic  as 
helter-skelter  methods  and  pell-mell  decisions. 

In  enlisting  habit  through  training,  however, 
we  must  not  be  too  easily  satisfied  with  the  simple 
automatic.  It  is  well  enough  that  children  learn 
as  a  matter  of  course  to  do  thus  and  so  without 
question.  Habits  early  bred  are  an  immense  sav- 
ing of  the  power  and  energy  so  wasted  by  those 


CLEAR  THINKING  193 

not  thus  protected,  but  good  habits  alone  will  not 

avail   to   protect   indefinitely,   unless    associated 

j with  true  knowledge.     Curiosity,  intelligence  and 

i  reason  all  demand  to  know,  and  so  we  should 

^understand  self,  and  things,  and  people,  and  life's 

difficulties   and   inevitables.    Eeason   must  have 

imore  than  habit  upon  which  to   develop.     The 

j  rational  man  masters  life  through  the  power  of 

j  forethought,  even  as  the  emotional  man  is  defeated 

|  through  the  mastery  of  fear- thought. 

It  is  heartening  to  realise  how  large  a  propor- 
tion of  life  can  be  anticipated,  and  met  forearmed 
through  that  forethought  which,  ever  choosing  the 
jbest,  has   eliminated   error  and  confusion,   and 
'  which  has  escaped  the  Slough  of  selfish  Despond. 
;  Scientific  forethought  has  indicated  in  its  bene- 
;  ficent  provisions  for  the  race  what  personal  fore- 
thought   may    do    for    the    individual.     To-day, 
yellow  fever  and  malaria,  smallpox,  typhoid  and 
diphtheria — diseases  which  a  few  generations  ago 
I  were  desolating  and  disfiguring  humanity — have 
practically    disappeared    since     scientific    f  ore- 
.  thought  has  been  forced  upon  the  individual  by 
the  health   authorities.     Clearness   and   breadth 
and  wholesome  interest  may  ward  off  nervous- 
ness, and  with  accuracy,  unselfishness  and  fair- 
ness, hold  in  check  even  dread  insanity,  when  such 
thought  methods  have  been  made  habitual. 

No  man  reaches  that  mental  independence  where 
he  dare  disregard  the  fateful  truth  that  the 
thoughts  which  he  habitually  keeps  in  the  fore- 
ground will  mysteriously  attract  thoughts  of  like 
kind.  Group  will  be  added  to  group,  power  to 


194       THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

power,  weakness  to  weakness.  Mental  strength 
is  the  price  of  mental  ease.  In  the  face  of  the 
complexities,  the  demands,  the  insistencies  and  the 
confusions  of  modern  highly  wrought  life,  mental 
serenity  can  only  come  through  the  formation  of 
habitual  thought  selection,  in  which  reason  pre- 
sides and  insists  that  all  thinking  be  clear  think- 
ing. 


CHAPTER  XV 
MOULDING  THE  EMOTIONS 

Physical  Help. — In  our  study  of  the  emotions 
we  saw  how  deeply  rooted  in  our  natures  is  this 
ever-attending,  changing,  moving,  pleasure-pain 
sense;  saw  how  intimately  interwoven  is  feeling, 
in  its  ever-varying  forms,  with  all  thought;  how 
it  foreshadows,  accompanies  and  follows  all  action 
— man's  most  intimate  associate.  Ever  whisper- 
ing, taunting,  begging,  threatening,  demanding, 
domineering,  tyrannising,  exhorting,  inspiring,  it 
may  be  a  gentle  counsellor,  a  genial  companion, 
a  selfish  master,  a  slave-driving  tyrant.  The  joys 
of  life  or  the  wretchedness  of  existence  rest  in  the 
emotions '  power  over  the  individual. 

The  harmful  effects  of  unwholesome  physical 
conditions,  toxic  states  resulting  from  food  errors 
and  insufficient  muscular  activity,  result  in  acute 
emotional  depression  from  time  to  time  in  the 
average  so-called  normal  life.  Because  of  these 
and  other  physical  causes,  many  pass  through 
long  periods  of  emotional  misery;  while  in  the 
particularly  susceptible,  a  prolonged  and  intensi- 
fied autointoxication  may  result  in  attacks  of 
genuine  melancholia.  Our  emotions  are  so  closely 
and  intimately  a  part  of  us  that  there  are  no 
physical  or  mental  activities  which  do  not  directly 

195 


196        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

or  indirectly  influence  them,  even  as  the  feelings 
cast  their  spell  over  all  that  is  thought  and  done. 
In  the  pages  devoted  to  the  physical  causes  of 
nervousness,  much  which  is  pertinent  and  prac- 
tical to  the  helpful  modification  of  the  emotions 
which  harm,  has  been  suggested.  The  healthy 
body  is  normally  the  home  of  happiness,  for  de- 
pression and  pessimism  are  but  mental  expres- 
sions of  illness  frequently  developing  from  un- 
healthy physical  conditions ;  and  the  first  step  in 
remodelling  the  emotions  lies  in  instituting  sane 
and  wholesome  habits  of  physical  living,  since 
physical  living  is  the  basis  of  all  manifestations 
of  human  life.  In  learning  to  eat  for  efficiency, 
we  will  eat  for  growing  emotional  comfort;  and 
slowly,  with  a  progress  which  ebbs  and  flows,  but 
with  reasonable  certainty,  sensations  of  comfort 
will  begin  to  creep  in  to  displace  the  old  chronic 
apprehension,  a  few  minutes  of  exuberance  lighten 
the  old  depression,  and  a  bright  trickle  of  con- 
fidence flow  across  the  barren  fields  of  despair. 
As  the  murky  swamp  water  of  inactivity  is  re- 
placed by  the  well-spring  of  health,  so,  gradually, 
will  the  poison-exhausted  brain  cells,  the  seat  and 
source  of  thought  and  feeling  and  being,  take  up 
new  energy  from  the  now  wholesome  blood ;  and 
out  of  the  rational  physical  life  alone  may  come 
a  miraculous  transformation,  even  as  from  the 
Slough  of  Despond  to  the  Mountains  Delectable. 
The  unity  of  mind  and  body  is  rarely  so  clearly 
shown  as  in  the  quick  return  of  emotional  com- 
fort so  usual  with  the  restitution  of  physical 
health.  Thus  the  double  reward  of  wholesome 


MOULDING  THE  EMOTIONS  197 

feeling  and  strength  of  being  comes  to  those  who 
will  masterfully  direct  their  bodily  welfare  into 
healthful  channels. 

Thought  Help. — As  the  mind  develops  and  the 
intellect  reaches  farther  and  wider  in  its  search 
for  knowledge,  reason  seeks  the  control  of  life, 
using  for  its  judgments  the  material  thus  pro- 
vided. The  emotions  assert  their  supremacy  of 
priority  as  man's  inherited  directing  influences, 
while  intellect  enters  the  field  of  consciousness 
as  a  usurper,  presuming  to  oust  feelings  from 
their  smug  power  of  control.  In  every  human 
being  in  which  any  pretence  of  development  has 
occurred,  consciously  or  unconsciously  the  ques- 
tion has  been  answered  as  to  which  should  be  the 
fundamental  controlling  influence  in  that  mind — 
intellect  or  feeling.  We  have  already  seen  that 
in  nervous  natures  all  responses  are  specially 
keen,  all  reactions  particularly  acute;  that  herein 
lies  their  innate  susceptibility  to  emotional 
domination.  Eeason  and  judgment  must  be  en- 
listed for  their  help,  must  be  cultivated  at  the 
expense  of  emotional  neglect ;  and,  for  the  neurotic 
particularly,  in  that  great  formative  conflict  be- 
tween thinking  and  feeling,  the  latter  influences 
must  be  systematically  discounted — certainly  such 
as  are  of  an  unhealthy  or  unhappy  nature.  If 
a  successful  culmination  in  the  fight  for  nervous 
stability  is  to  be  attained,  the  intellect's  right  to 
exercise  its  power  of  thought  selection,  its  right 
to  keep  in  the  eye  of  the  mind  that  which  is  fruit- 
ful and  beautiful  and  masterful,  must  be  con- 
served and  protected  from  Emotion's  jealous 


198        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

insistence  to  ever  court  and  control  the  interests 
of  Attention.  The  nervous,  particularly,  must 
sternly  resent  the  tendency  of  feeling  to  dictate 
decisions.  Judgments  based  upon  any  except  the 
best  obtainable  knowledge  are  usually  false  judg- 
ments, even  in  the  face  of  our  proud  assertion 
of  the  fineness  and  the  delicacy  and  the  wisdom 
of  our  intuitions.  Intuition  may  be  true  when 
a  result  of  the  keen  perceptions  of  accurately 
trained  observation,  but  even  intuitive  feeling  is 
particularly  prone  to  distort,  to  add  to  or  take 
from,  the  value  of  decisions. 

The  habit  of  cool  calculation  in  all  matters 
sufficiently  weighty  to  deserve  being  weighed  can 
be  slowly  developed,  even  in  face  of  the  stronger 
emotional  life,  if  determination  fits  worthy  desire. 
Much  nervous  suffering  grows  out  of  distressing 
emotional  complexes,  whose  presence  and  insist- 
ence and  discomfort  demand  of  the  mind  an  ex- 
planation, and  unless  reason  resolutely  stands 
guard,  these  very  feelings  will  suggest  their  rea- 
son for  discouragement,  for  repellent  dislike  or 
impelling  fear;  will  suggest  hate  thoughts  and 
dread  thoughts  having  no  basis  whatever  in  fact, 
and  yet  hounding  the  life  into  miserable  unhappi- 
ness,  though  they  represent  nothing  more  than 
the  mind's  unreasoned  explanation  for  the  emo- 
tional discord  which  exists.  Because  of  this 
emotional  fog,  the  mind  sees  through  a  glass 
darkly.  In  these  situations  reason  must  clear 
away  the  choking  mists,  reason  must  recognise 
the  power  of  feelings  to  befog  and  to  besmother 
with  doubt,  and  to  stifle  with  fear.  In  such  lives 


MOULDING  THE  EMOTIONS  199 

as  have  honoured  Eeason  by  bestowing  upon  it 
that  respect  ever  due  the  mind's  real  Buler,  such 
harmful  complexes  can  be  reasoned  out,  under- 
stood and  dispelled  through  the  potency  of  a  de- 
veloped power  of  contemplation.  When  the  flash 
of  feeling  sweeps  upon  the  stage,  asserting  its 
control,  it  is  time  to  stop  and  think  things  over. 
The  mind  should  be  able,  on  such  occasions,  to 
soon  replace  the  emotional  marionettes  by  reason- 
ing flesh  and  blood.  It  is  within  the  power  of 
normal  intellect,  through  its  ability  to  select 
thought  material,  to  displace  emotions '  irrational, 
harmful  and  impulsive  thought  fancies,  by  ideas 
that  strengthen,  by  thoughts  chiselled  out  of  fact's 
granite,  and  by  reasons  which  have  been  builded 
strong  in  the  work-shop  of  normal  experience. 

Emotions  undermine  nervous  stability,  fre- 
quently, through  the  neglects  of  simple  thought- 
lessness. We  are  apt  to  be  temporarily  attracted 
by  the  emotional  extravagances  in  the  actions  and 
attitudes  of  the  overvivacious.  But  if  we  are  not 
later  utterly  to  weary  of  them,  they  must  possess 
more  than  gush,  highly-keyed  chatter  and  senti- 
mental gabble — all  proper  and  charming  when 
time  and  occasion  are  considered,  but  more  often 
as  useless  and  wasteful  as  the  ever-running 
faucet.  Such  characters  are  exemplified  in  many 
time-killing  lives.  A  little  serious  thought  will 
protect  us  from  such  wasteful  habits,  and  help 
us  replace  "suds  with  substance.  Clear  thinking 
is  an  immense  help  in  saving  emotional  leakage 
and  exhaustion — in  clearing  up  error.  Crooked 
thoughts  soon  get  us  out  of  harmony  with  our 


200        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

surroundings,  and  the  emotions  accompanying  the 
jangling  discord  of  cross-purposes  and  misadjust- 
ments  can  only  be  those  of  hopes  disappointed 
and  confidences  wrecked;  and  desperation  or 
leaden  depression  or  uneasy  recklessness  will  fre- 
quently be  the  penalty  of  the  wrong  frontage  of 
erroneous  thinking. 

Feeling  Help. — We  have  referred  so  frequently 
to  the  weaknesses  and  dangers  of  emotional  su- 
premacy in  the  nervous  life  that  it  will  be  quite 
natural  for  the  reader  to  feel  that  his  reeducation 
will  probably  not  end  until  he  has  rendered  him- 
•self  as  emotionless  as  a  clam.  But  this  is  not  at 
all  the  intent  of  this  chapter.  As  long  as  we  are 
human  we  will  feel,  and  feel  keenly  and  constantly. 
It  is  not  at  all  a  question  of  not  feeling,  but  it  is 
emphatically  a  question  of  right  feeling;  not  an 
impoverishment  of  the  wonderful  emotional  life 
that  is  urged,  but  a  cultivation  and  enrichment 
and  a  beautifying  of  the  emotional  nature,  pos- 
sible as  long  as  life  clings  to  the  ideals  of  develop- 
ment. The  hurtful  brands  of  emotions  may  haunt 
man  as  the  very  shades  of  Gehenna,  may  turn 
all  which  should  be  sunshine  and  gladness  and  joy 
into  Stygian  blackness,  may  chill  the  very  cockles 
of  the  heart;  even  as  wholesome  beneficent  feel- 
ings may  open  up  vistas  of  Heaven,  displace  mid- 
night gloom  with  the  golden  glint  of  noonday, 
and  suffuse  every  interspace  of  the  body  with  the 
thrilling  eagerness  of  life.  There  are  emotions  to 
be  avoided  as  a  pestilence;  there  are  others  to 
be  welcomed  and  cherished  as  mother-love.  There 
are  emotions  that  strain  and  drain,  emotions  that 


MOULDING  THE  EMOTIONS  201 

maim — emotions  more  painful,  exhausting  and  de- 
pleting than  the  tire  of  intense  and  protracted 
physical  or  mental  labour.  But  from  these  we 
should  turn  with  gratitude  to  those  that  cheer, 
that  strengthen,  that  inspire,  that  save.  It  is  the 
tonic  of  such  emotions,  rather  than  the  gentian, 
quassia  or  strychnin,  which  the  nervous  patient 
needs.  The  recognition  that  hurtful  feeling  states 
and  emotional  habits  can  slowly,  often  discourag- 
ingly,  but  truly,  be  replaced  by  those  that  stimu- 
late and  give  strength  and  bring  joy,  stands  for 
saving  knowledge  to  the  earnest-minded  sufferer. 

There  are,  unfortunately,  numbers  of  emotional 
topers  who  have  drunk  so  long  and  steadily  of 
feeling  excess  that  their  veins  are  saturated  with 
emotional  toxins,  in  whose  lives  reason  is  useless, 
and  will  has  long  since  been  emasculated;  and 
selection  and  attention  have  failed  under  the  con- 
trol of  ruthless,  irrational  feeling  life.  For  such 
disorganised  emotional  bondsmen  there  is  prac- 
tically no  hope  for  self-restoration.  They  must 
be  placed  in  the  hands  of  the  trained  expert,  and 
under  his  rational  disciplinary  care  be  painfully 
reeducated.  Miracles  of  cure,  even  in  those  ap- 
parently hopelessly  demoralised  emotionally,  are 
constantly  resulting  through  such  personal  spe- 
cialised skill  and  attention. 

The  great  majority  of  the  nervous  are  not 
wrecks.  They  are  not  helpless  slaves  of  feeling, 
and  with  the  realisation  of  the  damage  which 
their  unhealthy  emotions  are  producing  in  their 
lives,  in  the  knowledge  that  feelings  of  this  type 
may  be  replaced  by  the  strength-giving  and  power- 


202        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

breeding  kind,  the  determination  should  come  to 
enter  training  in  the  art  of  systematic  emotional 
moulding.  In  replacing  flabby  muscles  by  the 
strong,  energy-producing  kind,  in  choosing  food 
to  nourish  brain  and  blood  rather  than  to  titillate 
the  palate,  and  in  demanding  of  the  mind  the 
thought  selection  which  leads  to  mental  clearness 
and  power,  the  difficult  is  consistently  being 
chosen  in  the  face  of  the  pleadings  of  indolence 
and  momentary  comfort.  Even  as  the  accom- 
plishment of  all  developmental  ideals  demands 
effort — effort  of  resolution,  effort  of  attention, 
efforts  of  denial — so  the  displacing  of  hurtful, 
weakening  emotions,  by  helpful,  strengthening 
ones,  can  only  be  successfully  accomplished 
through  a  persistence  and  an  insistence  which 
stands  for  effort  oft  repeated — repeated  in  the 
face  of  defeat,  repeated  until  it  has  become  habit- 
ual, repeated  until  we  have  become  inured  to  its 
fag. 

The  trouble  usually  starts  in  childhood.  Dur- 
ing those  years  of  normal  emotional  dominance, 
indulgence  and  weak  parents,  themselves  prob- 
ably uncontrolled,  fail  utterly  in  demanding  of 
their  children  wholesome,  developing,  emotional 
mastery.  The  ungoverned  passions  of  children 
break  out  unrestrained,  in  storms  of  anger,  fits 
of  temper.  Tempestuous  demands  are  weakly 
granted  by  parents  to  avoid  a  ' l  scene, ' '  to  save  the 
unpleasantness  of  the  half -hour  devoted  to  respect- 
producing  parental  control.  In  many  homes  the 
children's  emotions  are  allowed  to  run  rampant, 
with  no  check  until  the  ridicule  of  school  life 


MOULDING  THE  EMOTIONS  203 

modifies,  while  rarely  remedying,  the  weakness. 
So  the  weeds  in  the  emotional  garden  have  fre- 
quently been  allowed  to  choke  flower  and  fruit- 
producing  growth.  The  serious  business  of  adult- 
hood is  entered  upon  with  a  crop  of  perverse 
mental  habits,  the  kind  which  grow  spontaneously 
out  of  the  narrow,  often  ugly  interests  of  self, 
with  little  or  no  ability  to  successfully  substitute 
for  these  the  joyous  and  inspiring  ones.  It  is 
true  that,  until  we  learn  unselfish  thoughts,  until 
we  do  unselfish  deeds,  crude,  primitive,  selfish 
feelings  will  grip  strong  the  life  which  has  neg- 
lected their  uprooting.  Still,  unless  emotional 
insanity  has  robbed  life  of  the  capacity  for  whole- 
some feeling,  it  is  possible  to  substitute  the  worthy 
for  the  harmful,  the  heartening  for  the  corroding, 
the  joyous  for  the  sad.  Emotions  may  be  culti- 
vated even  as  muscle  and  appetite,  and  through 
the  help  of  thought  selection  the  art  of  rejoicing 
may  come,  even  on  the  heels  of  much  which  we  call 
trouble. 

We  slip  and  fall  physically,  or  mentally,  or  mor- 
ally, or  socially,  or  financially,  and  "Woe  is  me!" 
is  Emotion's  temptation.  But  when  one  has 
learned  the  joy-sense  through  daily  substitution 
of  expressions  of  enjoyment  for  those  of  com- 
plaint, through  the  self-forgetting  smile,  even 
though  the  smiling  face  adorns  an  aching  head, 
through  the  courageous  saying  of  the  joy-words, 
though  things  are  so  tangled  that  we  have  to  pause 
-to  find  a  single  bright  thread  in  the  snarl;  yet, 
blessed  with  such  training,  we  pick  ourselves  up, 
and  with  a  smile  that  may  have  nothing  behind  it 


204        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

but  resolution,  go  on  mastering  the  art  of  rejoic- 
ing, elevating  our  emotions  from  those  of  the 
weakling  to  those  of  the  ruler. 

Just  as  truly  as  the  mind  may  learn  to  clear 
the  haze  surrounding  simple  daily  acts,  with  equal 
certainty  those  darker  mists  of  depression  which 
so  insistently  drift  over  our  work  to  distort  it 
into  worry  may  be  cleared  away  by  the  sunlight 
of  courage;  much  which  is  called  sodden  sadness 
may  be  transformed  into  the  wholesomely  serious ; 
while  morbid  moroseness  may  be  displaced  by  the 
ardent  earnestness  which  represents  the  confidence 
and  power  of  emotional  health.  Good  emotions 
can  be  systematically  exercised,  for  with  whole- 
some thought  life  most  situations  present  some 
elements  from  which  a  silver  lining  may  be  made. 
The  mind  is  indolent,  miserably  narrowed,  hope- 
lessly hardened  or  deeply  corrupted  which  is 
utterly  unable  to  find  some  ray  of  brightness  in 
the  very  losses  which  rob  the  present  of  the  reward 
of  past  well-doing,  in  the  disappointments  which 
shut  out  some  cherished  possibilities  of  the 
future,  or  even  in  those  cruelly  sad  hours  when 
our  own  flesh  and  blood  leave  us  to  return  no 
more. 

But  it  is  not  in  the  great  emergencies  of  life 
that  our  emotions  are  to  be  trained.  The  cheerful 
face  and  glad  word  and  the  unruffled  responses 
at  the  breakfast  table,  the  cheer  that  goes  into 
the  work-a-day  life  and  faces  its  hourly  disap- 
pointments, the  hope  and  courage  which  rob  con- 
stantly recurring  irritations  of  their  sting,  and 
which  ever  meet  impatient,  unreasonable,  disap- 


MOULDING  THE  EMOTIONS  205 

pointing  human  nature  without  the  surrender  of 
good-feeling,  combine  to  accumulate  power  for  all 
demands.  Emotional  readjustment  is  gradually 
effected  through  the  patient  insistence  upon  not 
only  the  cheering  smile  for  the  benefit  of  others, 
hut  upon  the  kindly,  hopeful  feeling  pervading 
our  relations  to  our  work  and  to  our  fellow- 
workers. 

There  is  no  form  of  mental  or  physical  activity 
which  develops  its  full  strength  without  frequent 
repetition,  and  the  unworthy,  hurtful  emotions  can 
gradually  be  blunted  and  their  insistence  weakened 
through  a  resolute  determination  to  refuse  them 
their  wonted  expression.  In  fact,  it  is  the  giving 
way  to  emotions  that  furnishes  their  strength. 
Unfortunately,  this  law  works  as  efficiently  to 
weaken  the  good  as  the  bad  affections,  and  dwarf- 
ing of  the  higher  emotions  is  a  common  occurrence 
in  the  lives  of  men  and  women  enjoying  the  best 
advantages  of  cultural  life.  Two  or  three  times 
a  week  they  hear  the  ideals  of  living  expressed 
with  fervour,  and  eloquent  appeals  are  made  to 
their  magnanimity,  their  generosity,  their  sym- 
pathy, their  duty  to  their  neighbour;  and  yet  the 
good  impulsions  thus  started  soon  shatter  and 
fade  when  not  given  expression  in  action.  The 
most  appealing  sermons,  stimulating  addresses, 
heart-touching  lectures,  are  perfunctorily  dis- 
cussed as  to  their  form  and  esthetic  qualities,  or 
at  best  stimulate  an  exchange  of  a  few  well-chosen 
sentences  of  approval.  But  there  is  no  increase 
in  the  donation  of  dollars  to  help  enlighten  be- 
nighted humanity ;  no  time  is  devoted  to  a  personal 


206        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

investigation  of  wrong  conditions ;  no  sacrifice  of 
time  or  comfort  follows  those  eloquent  prompt- 
ings— promptings  which  should  have  aroused 
deep,  earnest,  sincere  feelings,  leading  on  to  deeds 
of  kind.  Such  neglect  following  emotional  in- 
spiration results  in  the  inevitable  atrophy  of  good 
impulses,  even  as  the  following  of  them  leads  to 
greatness  and  beauty  and  power  of  feeling. 

In  displacing  irritability — that  nagging,  waste- 
ful, emotional  temptation  which  may  become  an 
inveterate  feeling-habit — the  realisation  must  be 
brought  forcibly  home  that  it  is  not  the  perversity 
of  things  or  people,  it  is  not  the  clutter  or  uproar 
about  us,  it  is  not  misfortunes,  little  or  great,  not 
physical  ills  or  pains,  that  create  our  emotional 
weather.  We  are  our  own  weather  bureau,  our 
own  cyclone  centre,  our  own  producer  of  thunder- 
storms and  lightning-crashes ;  the  frosts  and  fogs 
and  chills  of  life  are  of  our  own  making;  and 
life 's  sunshine,  and  balmy,  genial,  refreshing  days 
are  made  in  our  own  hearts.  There  is  an  attitude 
which  simple  and  learned,  prince  and  pauper  can 
maintain  in  life 's  relations,  expressed  in  the  para- 
phrase of  the  court  oath:  'Keep  the  peace,  the 
whole  peace,  and  nothing  but  the  peace.'  For 
him  whose  relations  are  based  upon  this  ideal, 
life  will  ultimately  be  freed  of  the  fret  and  fume 
and  worry  of  the  commonplace.  It  is  remarkable 
what  success  attends  decisive  efforts  to  eliminate 
even  the  strong  impulse  and  fiercer  temper  of 
emotional  sprees.  Many  develop  from  impatient, 
hot-headed,  explosive  youth  into  even-balanced, 
emotion-mastered  maturity  through  that  deter- 


MOULDING  THE  EMOTIONS  207 

mination  which  puts  irritability  under  foot,  which 
counts  twenty  backwards,  repeats  the  warning 
verse  or  whistles  a  tune,  before  giving  expression 
to  the  threatened  anger-storm. 

For  the  fearful,  and  that  includes  a  multitude 
of  the  nervous,  the  fight  is  more  difficult.  Fear 
is  insidious;  it  injects  itself  into  many  of  life's 
relations  and  affairs  in  many  forms.  It  grips 
the  sensitive  with  an  impelling  force,  and  follows 
its  victim  like  a  haunting  shadow,  even  reaching 
its  clutching  claws  into  the  quiet  of  slumber, 
peopling  the  dark  and  lonely  hours  with  the  hor- 
rible visages  of  a  distraught  imagination;  reach- 
ing even  across  the  great  gulf  and  freezing  the 
soul  as  it  anticipates  the  hereafter.  Eeason 
could  rid  such  lives  of  a  great  mass  of  this  hurting 
fear  if  emotions  would  only  respond  to  reason. 
Reason's  insistence  is  true  when  it  reveals  fear 
as  a  beneficent,  as  a  useful,  saving  influence; 
when  it  asserts  that  fear  helpfully  exists  only  for 
that  which  is  definite,  for  that  which  is  certainly, 
obviously  and  unquestioningly  threatening;  and 
that  the  fear  of  the  indefinite  is  now,  and  forever 
shall  be,  a  curse  to  life.  Ninety-nine  per  cent,  of 
the  neurotic's  fear  is  for  that  which  may  never 
be,  for  the  intangible,  that  which  cannot  be  ex- 
pressed, or  accepted  by  reason. 

But  if  the  neurotic  cannot  accept  this  rational 
help,  this  help  which  makes  the  man  of  reason 
courageous  while  the  child  of  feeling  trembles  and 
quakes  and  quails,  hope  exists  for  him  in  the 
wholesome  emotion  of  faith.  Faith  can  displace 
the  thousand  and  one  anticipatory  dreads  and 


208        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

embryonic  fears  with  confidence  and  hope;  faith 
can  rob  the  most  extreme  terror  of  its  power  to 
shrivel  and  paralyse.  Faith  has  carried  youth 
and  maiden  into  the  Arena — faith  which  closed 
their  eyes  to  the  horrible  realities  of  a  martyr's 
death  and  looked  across  the  dark  river  to  the 
martyr's  victory;  faith  could  calmly  caress  the 
burning  faggots,  and  rise  serene  and  supreme 
above  the  agony  of  the  stake,  chanting  a  hymn 
of  love.  Unmoved  in  the  presence  of  utter  lone- 
liness and  neglect,  faith  has  entered  the  hearts  and 
minds  and  bodies  of  frail  women  and  weakened 
men,  and  led  them  fearlessly  through  years  of 
self-forgetfulness  and  self-denial,  captains  indeed 
of  their  fate. 

Fear  unrestrained  overcomes  wholesome  emo- 
tions, and  fills  life  with  a  jangle  of  false  alarms. 
Many  reality-dodging  neurotics  find — in  their 
poorly-balanced  emotions — worry-thoughts  and 
fear-thoughts,  which  they  interpret  as  evidences 
of  impending  insanity.  Day  after  day,  month 
after  month,  they  plan  most  effectively  to  go  in- 
sane, doing  everything  that  autosuggestion  and 
the  demoralisation  of  fear  can  do,  to  disorganise 
mental  stability.  In  many  of  the  selfish,  fear  has 
so  usurped  the  emotional  stage  as  to  have  quite 
eliminated  love  and  courage  from  the  scene.  The 
love-life,  like  the  faith-life,  can  rob  fear  of  its 
power  to  blight.  And  courage,  the  courage  which 
reason  has  taught  to  accept  the  inevitable,  to  face 
the  certainty  of  accident,  loss,  and  pain,  makes 
prisoner  of  Fear  and  holds  him  helplessly  bound, 
for  Fear  has  its  captors  all  double-strong.  The 


MOULDING  THE  EMOTIONS  209 

normal  mind  may  thus  rid  itself  of  its  deadly, 
sedition-breeding  traitors.  Faith  and  love  and 
courage  are  sentiments  before  which  Fear  and 
its  motley  tribe  cower  and  slink  away. 

For  that  other  great  army  of  sufferers,  the 
nervously  depressed,  the  fight  is  also  serious,  and 
long  and  difficult.  A  few  of  this  type  are  miser- 
able through  choice.  For  them  there  is  a  "joy 
in  melancholy. "  There  are  for  them  hidden  de- 
lights in  their  sombre  moods,  as  classically  ex- 
pressed by  Burton  three  centuries  ago : 

"All  my  joys  to  these  are  folly, 
Naught  so  sweet  as  melancholy. ' ' 

But  few,  even  of  those  who  indulge  constantly 
in  these  unwholesome  moods,  will  be  so  frank  as 
Burton.  From  them  arises  much  of  the  world's 
plaints  and  wails.  Many  scholastically  intelli- 
gent and  otherwise  well-bred  indulge  as  a  matter 
of  course  in  periodic  surrender  to  "the  blues. " 
Others  live  upon  an  emotional  see-saw;  it  is  the 
" blues "  one  day  or  one  week,  and  the  "glads" 
for  an  equal  time ;  or  the  alternation  may  be  more 
rapid,  and  it  is  difficult  for  their  friends  to  know 
from  hour  to  hour  in  which  mood  they  will  be 
found.  Thus  the  depressed  are  all  robbing  life, 
their  lives  and  others'. 

But  many,  through  inherited  tendencies,  through 
lack  of  wholesome  environmental  advantages  in 
childhood,  through  the  deadening  influence  of  later 
intoxications,  are  marked  as  with  the  brand  of 
Cain.  The  sick  in  moods  are  sources  of  infection 
no  less  real  than  those  suffering  from  tuberculosis. 


210        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

But  while  many  surrender  and  accept  their  vari- 
ously expressed  depressions  without  protest, 
others  fight  earnestly  and  persistently  to  rise 
above  their  murky  moods  and  replace  them  with 
love  of  duty,  love  of  truth,  love  of  nature,  love 
of  humanity — with  ethical,  esthetic  and  religious 
motives.  They  realise  that  the  mood  is  not  omnip- 
otent, that  there  is  a  power  of  mood-mastery. 
They  know  that  the  mood  is  movable ;  that  it  may 
be  temporarily  displaced  by  a  laugh,  a  joke,  a 
strain  of  music,  the  voice  of  a  child.  Even  the 
repression  of  mood  expression  helps.  A  "do-or- 
die"  determination  that  it  will  not  show,  that 
the  closest  friend  will  not  know  of  its  presence, 
the  courageous  assumption  of  cheer  will  gradually 
rob  depression  of  its  power.  But  this  is  a  glutton- 
ous monster,  feeding  upon  many  gentle  and 
otherwise  wholesome  lives,  a  monster  which  re- 
quires the  combined  power  of  health  of  body, 
clearness  of  thought,  strength  of  faith  and  reso- 
lution of  spirit,  to  kill. 

Will  Help. — And  finally,  the  mind's  great  work- 
ing power,  the  will,  can  be  relied  upon  to  do  much 
in  emotional  remodelling.  Surrender  to  feelings 
finds  excuse  in  our  little  pains,  our  headaches, 
backaches  or  tired  feet,  in  our  colds  and  hours 
of  general  discomfort.  From  these  and  similar 
sources  wells  up  the  great  chorus  of  "I  don't 
feel  able ' ' — for  duty — seldom  unable  for  diverting 
amusement  or  pleasure.  Overprotection  from  pain 
has  resulted  in  popularising  the  fear-of-pain  idea, 
till  many  moderns  are  fit  only  for  conservatory 
growth.  Our  self-coddled  and  professionally- 


MOULDING  THE  EMOTIONS  211 

protected  bodies  are  taught  to  shrink  from  and 
avoid  pain  as  disaster.  With  all  the  high  refine- 
ments of  modern  comfort,  we  have  become  over- 
sensitive, shivering  in  every  breeze,  wrapping, 
overdressing  and  living  in  overheated  rooms, 
because  comforts  soon  become  unreasonable,  al- 
most insatiable  in  their  demands ;  and  with  a  pill 
for  every  pain  and  a  drug  for  every  discomfort, 
we  make  ourselves  physical  cowards.  Yet  how 
quickly  little  aches  and  moderate  discomforts  can 
be  put  under  foot!  Ten  days  of  enthusiastic 
"roughing  it"  changes  the  man  or  woman,  who 
is  still  able  to  make  his  own  red  blood,  from  a 
shivering  whiner  to  one  who  can  roll  up  in  his 
blanket  and  waterproof,  and  sleep  peacefully 
through  rain  or  snow.  The  physician  soon  learns 
that  most  complaints  of  suffering  come  from  pa- 
tients with  little  ills ;  that  he  who  is  gravely  sick, 
he  who  is  in  the  grasp  of  deep-seated  or  fatal 
illness,  knows  not  the  plaints  of  my  lady  with 
the  headache.  With  will  at  our  backs,  duty  looms 
large,  indulgence  retreats ;  and  until  we  know  that 
the  sickness  is  serious,  we  are  on  duty,  ill  or  well. 
Much  more  damage  to  modern  health  results  from 
underwork,  than  is  produced  by  the  injury  which 
comes  from  working  when  ill. 

In  the  development  of  will-strength,  ungoverned 
emotions  are  its  natural  antagonists.  With  grow- 
ing will-power,  abnormal  emotional  expression  is 
subject  to  increasing  control.  Strength  of  will 
may  be  spoken  of  in  terms  of  emotional  mastery. 
He  whose  passions  are  still  rampant,  whose 
periodic  outbreaks  make  his  company  a  menace, 


212        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

though  wilful  as  Nero,  is  truly  a  volitional 
weakling.  With  every  successful  effort  in  the 
control  of  emotional  expression,  there  is  a  lessen- 
ing of  the  emotional  force.  As  soon  as  the  child 
realises  that  none  of  his  desires  are  gratified  until 
emotional  self-control  is  manifest;  that  his  cry- 
ing and  screaming  and  foot-stamping  and  head- 
bumping  expressions  of  impatience  and  anger  are 
rewarded  only  by  a  persistent  neglect  of  these 
passionately  expressed  demands ;  and  that  nothing 
but  merited  punishment  is  secured  by  such  actions, 
the  foundation  of  his  self-control  is  laid.  If,  in 
addition,  evidences  of  kindly  feeling  and  courtesy 
are  required  before  his  requests  are  honoured, 
and  if  such  methods  are  consistently  employed, 
early  emotional  poise  will  result. 

As  the  years  slip  by,  our  treatment  of  our  emo- 
tions decides  whether  they  will  weaken  or  inten- 
sify. Properly  governed,  they  become  obedient, 
faithful  servants  of  the  mind;  properly  trained, 
they  keep  life's  cup  teeming  with  happiness — for 
habitual  right-feeling  becomes  as  possible  through 
emotional  moulding,  as  clear-thinking  through 
mental  readjustment.  Again  the  great  law  of  sub- 
stitution is  helpful,  and  self-mastery  can  replace 
the  most  diverse  forms  of  emotional  outbreaks. 
The  secret  of  this  mastery  is  found  in  a  resolute 
stepping  away  from  self  the  second  the  emotional 
clutch  is  felt.  There  is  always  something  in  the 
face  or  action  of  our  irritator,  of  him  who  is  pro- 
voking or  opposing,  in  the  one  we  fear  or  whose 
presence  oppresses,  some  need,  or  weakness,  or 
peculiarity  of  his  to  which  we  can  for  the  moment 


MOULDING  THE  EMOTIONS  213 

attend.  His  emotional  control  or  lack  thereof,  the 
strength  or  weakness  of  his  mouth,  the  portent  of 
his  motile  pupils,  the  workings  of  his  fingers,  the 
tension  of  his  frame,  the  inflection  of  his  words 
— any  of  these  may  be  made  temporary  objects  of 
interest,  momentarily  holding  the  thought,  until 
the  emotion,  which  is  so  intent  upon  gripping  and 
mastering,  finds  itself  checked,  while  the  more 
deliberate  will  lays  hold.  We  have  stepped  out- 
side of  self  for  the  moment;  we  can  now  return 
and  find  our  house  in  order. 

It  all  stands  for  strife,  for  strife  with  self. 
That  which  would  detain  us  prisoners — knowing 
increasing  poverty  of  joy-thought  and  meagreness 
of  love-thought — combats  with  the  self  which 
would  courageously  face  the  problem  of  displacing 
primal  selfishness,  with  world-including,  soul- 
developing,  externalisation.  Enduring  enjoy- 
ment through  the  lengthening  years  of  life  must 
be  earned ;  it  comes  only  through  that  consistency 
of  effort  which  remoulds  our  perverse  and  dam- 
aging emotions  into  those  capable  of  bringing 
self -perpetuating  joy. 


CHAPTEE  XVI 
WILLING  WILLS 

Necessity  for  Will  Reeducation. — As  we  look 
out  upon  our  neighbours,  and  in  upon  ourselves, 
we  realise  that  quite  a  bit  of  life  is  awry.  Errors 
in  living  and  failures  in  life  are  common  sights. 
Ignorance  explains  much  of  this.  So  many  do 
not  know.  Indifference  is  a  defect  which  allows 
some  characters  to  leak  and  waste;  but  in  these 
days  of  ever-widening  knowledge,  indolence,  in- 
decision and  defective  self-control  are  far  more 
frequently  the  cause  of  the  neurotic's  plight. 
Such  defects  are  only  possible  in  the  absence  of 
will,  the  only  force  that  can  utilise  wisdom,  and 
can  hold  muscle  and  mind  true,  and  thus  make 
right  living  possible.  Keason  chooses  the  way  for 
the  hour,  for  the  day — the  great  way  of  life.  The 
choice  of  wisdom  may  be  unquestioned,  its  selec- 
tion one  which  offers  a  successful  culmination  of 
plans,  or  promises  a  happy  destination;  but  cul- 
mination or  destination  can  never  be  reached 
unless  active  will  compels  the  expression  of  sus- 
tained effort.  Were  such  will  universal,  the  many 
would  long  since  have  realised  all  of  man's  good 
purposes ;  for  unique  indeed  is  the  life  which  has 
not  planned  better  than  it  has  executed.  Action 
is  born  in  will.  Idea  suggests,  impulse  urges,  but 

214 


WILLING  WILLS  215 

action  is  the  result  of  the  will's  yea  or  nay;  and 
in  the  final  reckoning,  as  in  daily  experience,  a 
man  is  only  what  he  does.  His  thoughts  may 
represent  perfect  prodigies  of  portent,  his  ideas 
fairly  scintillate  the  brilliancy  of  genius,  emo- 
tions never  so  fine  may  course  through  his  veins 
and  set  every  force  of  his  being  in  eager,  waiting 
expectancy;  but  without  expression  in  word,  in 
page,  in  deed  of  daring,  in  touch  of  love,  his  value 
is  as  nothing — it  all  stands  for  useless  waste. 

As  we  reach  into  life's  cornucopia,  be  it  ne'er 
so  overflowing,  and  note  its  gifts  for  us,  we  are 
prone  to  complain  of  the  burdens  they  bring.  As 
we  open  each  little  package  of  a  day,  we  rarely 
find  one  which  does  not  contain  duty,  does  not 
disclose  trouble,  or  disappointment,  or  loss  or 
hard  endeavour.  We  save  and  accumulate,  and 
a  night's  frost  destroys  our  golden  crop;  the 
heavens  withhold  their  accustomed  rains,  and  half 
the  year's  increase  fails  to  mature;  unexpected 
illness,  the  rascality  of  a  trusted  friend,  and  our 
margin  of  saving  is  wiped  away.  We  under- 
exercise,  and  slowly  illness  and  weakness  creep 
upon  us ;  we  overindulge,  and  sudden  sickness,  or 
ultimately,  certain  incapacity  awaits  us.  To  the 
thoughtless,  life's  gifts  have  more  of  the  hard 
than  the  pleasant;  but  to  the  thoughtful,  the  un- 
derstanding will  certainly  come  that  all  this 
weight  and  burden  but  indicate  that  life  is  delib- 
erately planned  to  develop  wills.  An  active, 
willing  will  is  the  essential  basis  of  character.  He 
who  takes  what  is  proffered  him  from  hour  to  hour 
from  life's  great  treasury,  facing  the  situation, 


216        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

meeting  the  need,  accepting  the  challenge,  turning 
not  backward,  delaying  not,  refusing  not,  will 
inevitably  attain  a  superb  independence  over 
what  the  whimpering  weakling  names  "  misfor- 
tune." Life's  so-called  ills  but  challenge  our 
wills. 

"To-morrow  the  hot  furnace  flame 
Will  search  the  heart  and  try  the  frame, 
And  stamp  with  honour  or  with  shame 
These  vessels  made  of  clay. ' ' 

In  the  shame  of  weakness  and  in  the  acceptance 
of  unworthy  defeat,  thousands  lose  the  good  of 
life,  living  multiplying  years  of  needless  nervous 
wretchedness  because  of  weak  wills,  sometimes 
lost  wills.  Common  animal  indulgence  and  slav- 
ery to  habits  of  self -gratification  rob  character  of 
the  virtues  which  are  the  earnest  of  victory,  sap 
decisions  of  all  promise  of  fulfilment,  and  so  rot 
the  fibre  of  character  as  to  sink  their  victims  out 
of  the  category  of  manhood. 

With  each  year  of  life  the  individual  becomes 
more  completely  a  being  of  habits,  some  of  which 
are  the  mere  compilation  of  passive  choice,  un- 
productive and  often  detrimental,  the  offspring 
of  the  narrowest  of  self-interests.  Such  habits, 
lacking  in  the  elements  of  true  virility — make- 
shift, compromising  expedients — simply  pile  the 
burdens  of  existence  ahead.  The  habits  that  con- 
struct and  develop,  which  certainly  produce  power, 
which  truly  rob  the  days  of  the  waste  of  weakly 
repeated  effort,  are  those  formed  by  an  active 
will,  the  result  of  deliberate  choice  of  that  which 


WILLING  WILLS  217 

at  the  time  stands  for  denial.  A  few  such  habits 
entering  into  life  prove  productive  sources  of 
energy — thereafter  life  is  a  positive  force. 

The  will-less  and  weak-willed  are  less  common 
among  the  nervous  than  the  wilful.  From  the 
standpoint  of  nervous  reeducation,  every  wilful 
patient  is  a  hopeful  risk.  Wilfulness  is  a  force, 
wilfulness  is  a  manifestation  of  will  power — will 
power  in  an  active,  assertive  form,  only  mis- 
directed. Let  the  wilful  train  his  mind  and  heart 
toward  a  higher  good;  let  him  see  and  feel  the 
better  duty,  and  this  selfish  manifestation  of 
volitional  power  will  find  unselfish  expression, 
self-seeking  determinations  will  'attempt  that  which 
is  better  than  self,  and  from  mere  domineering 
wilfulness  will  develop  the  royal  personality — 
through  wills  willing  the  right. 

Willing  Effort. — Six  thousand  miles  is  saved 
each  vessel  sailing  from  New  York  to  San  Fran- 
cisco by  the  Panama  Canal,  and  weeks  of  time  and 
a  thousand  tons  of  coal — an  economy  of  dollars 
and  effort  which,  when  multiplied  by  all  the  sail- 
ings of  a  century,  will  represent  the  wealth  of  an 
empire.  The  Panama  Canal  is  a  monument  to 
effort — one  of  the  modern  wonders  of  the  world 
— constructed  through  the  indomitable  persever- 
ance of  Anglo-Saxon  wills.  The  idea  of  such  t a 
passage  came  into  the  minds  of  most  active 
schoolboys  in  their  study  of  geography.  The 
engineering  problems  were  great,  but  the  Panama 
Canal  will  ever  stand  as  a  superb  example  of  the 
overcoming  of  difficulty  piled  upon  difficulty. 
Intelligence  directed  effort,  and  the  intensive 


218        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

effort  of  unflinching  wills  changed  a  pest-hole  of 
disease  into  the  healthiest  zone  in  the  western  con- 
tinent ;  assembled  and  coordinated  a  motley  multi- 
tude of  labourers  into  a  virile,  aggressive,  re- 
sourceful, resistless  army.  The  tropical  sun,  the 
tropical  torrents,  the  world-old  solidity  and  re- 
pose of  earth  and  stone,  gave  way  to  man's  will; 
and  ocean  reached  out  to  meet  ocean,  and  distance 
was  bisected.  Active  will  works  with  decision 
always  toward  an  object,  and  action  will  ever 
stand  for  the  whole  and  final  expression  of  man. 
Indolence,  failure  and  despair  are  eloquent  in 
their  counsel  of  surrender.  Apathy,  neglect, 
weakening  passivity,  disintegration  of  physical, 
mental  and  moral  strength  set  in  when  effort 
fails.  In  these  "degenerate  times, "  neglect  of 
physical  effort  is  the  temptation  of  all  mental 
workers.  The  attendant  weariness  of  work  of 
mind  is  unwisely  accepted  as  an  equivalent  of 
fatigue  of  muscle ;  the  fundamental  chemical  laws 
of  physical  well-being  are  violated;  and  weari- 
ness begets  weariness.  Any  plea  which  would 
intimate  that  man  should  return  to  the  life  of 
mere  mechanical  effort  would  but  belie  the  race's 
progress,  and  designate  the  mental  as  inferior  to 
the  physical;  but  that  great  chorus  of  discord 
welling  forth  from  the  multitudes  of  those  con- 
demned to  days  or  lives  of  nervous  pain  and  un- 
rest, is  but  an  appeal  for  guided  wills  that  can 
choose,  and  consistently  and  persistently  devote 
those  few  weekly  hours  to  the  determined  physical 
effort  which  is  the  price  of  generations  of  sus- 
tained health.  To-day  this  failure  to  properly  use 


WILLING  WILLS  219 

our  bodies,  that  we  may  know  physical  and  nervous 
health,  is  being  laid  with  increasing  emphasis  at 
the  door  of  unwilling  wills.  Few,  when  they  feel 
the  grip  of  nervous  restlessness  or  the  chill  of 
nervous  depression,  but  promptly  decide  on  some 
modification  of  their  physical  life  which  they 
believe  will  be  helpful;  fewer  of  these  few  still 
have  the  will  force  to  prolong  their  wise  resolu- 
tions sufficiently  to  attain  lasting  benefit.  The 
will's  most  beneficent  action  rests  in  its  ability 
to  manacle  attention  to  the  object  of  its  rational 
choice. 

Feeling  is  coy — in  the  nervously  ill  she  is  fright- 
ful. She  is  persistent  in  her  efforts  to  woo  or 
stampede  attention  from  will's  control,  and  effort 
of  attention  is  but  another  expression  for  will. 
In  the  independent,  unswerving  direction  of 
thought,  resides  much  of  that  immense  power  for 
serene  supremacy,  attained  by  the  exceptional 
individual  who  transmutes  joy  and  gladness,  and 
sorrow  and  sadness  into  resistless  character. 
Through  will  discipline,  man's  vaunted  supremacy 
of  mind  over  body  is  realised. 

It  is  only  through  our  willingness  to  put  forth 
effort  that  the  body  may  know  that  judicious 
hardening  which  will  free  the  nervous  system 
from  its  slavery  to  feeling,  from  its  love  of  in- 
capacitating comforts.  Only  thus  may  we  acquire 
a  tolerance  to  changes  in  the  weather,  to  summer 's 
heat  or  winter's  cold,  a  tolerance  to  those  scores 
of  discomforts  which  must  be  met  and  faced  and 
assimilated  before  our  declaration  of  independ- 
ence to  nervous  tyranny  can  be  proclaimed.  So, 


220        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

many  of  the  nervously  weak  have  obtained  their 
unhappy  distinction  through  systematic  avoidance 
of  effort.  Many  such  develop  an  ingenuity  in 
the  avoidance  of  temporary  discomforts  quite 
sufficient  to  accomplish  a  serious  reformation. 

Many  of  the  nervous  will  realise  their  need  for 
will-strengthening,  will  see  in  their  habits  a  grow- 
ing desire  to  avoid  voluntary  effort,  will  recognise 
an  increasing  tendency  to  shirk  and  shrink  from 
that  which  suggests  fatigue.  Many  consider 
themselves  quite  unable  for  aggressive,  active 
effort,  until  they  have  reluctantly  and  gently 
initiated  the  day  with  a  series  of  comfort-breeding 
concessions.  For  these,  and  for  all  who  find  their 
wills  lacking  in  punch,  much  will  be  accomplished 
in  the  restitution  of  willing  wills  through  a  self- 
discipline  which  insists  upon  starting  the  day 
right.  Perchance  at  first  but  a  simple,  aggressive 
act  of  will  domination  can  be  enforced.  The  least 
that  should  satisfy  is  a  resolute  assault  upon  the 
middle  of  the  floor  before  the  clock  has  finished 
striking  the  appointed  hour,  a  brave  handful  of 
cold  water  dashed  over  unwilling  neck  and  chest, 
with  a  minute's  vigorous  rubbing  of  the  cold  sur- 
face into  glowing  gratitude,  then  two  or  three 
lungfuls  of  the  freshest  and  coldest  air  obtainable, 
and  a  half -minute  of  sharp — yes,  vicious — station- 
ary running.  He  of  developed  will  in  a  developed 
body  will  not  be  satisfied  with  less  than  a  cold-tub 
start,  followed  by  ten  or  fifteen  minutes '  intensive, 
fatigue-producing  physical  exercise — in  all  cases, 
the  morning  start  which  leaves  one  panting  and 
fatigued,  Difficult  at  first,  "senselessly  exhaust- 


WILLING  WILLS  221 

ing, ' '  the  self -petted  one  will  exclaim,  but  a  habit 
which,  persevered  in,  develops  a  margin  of  will- 
strength,  assuring  as  the  years  multiply,  an 
invaluable  reserve.  When  one  has  resolutely, 
conscientiously  and  consistently  put  into  the  first 
fifteen  or  twenty  minutes  of  the  day,  through  his 
own  volition,  by  his  own  choice,  a  concentration 
of  effort  more  intense  than  will  be  demanded  of 
him  during  a  like  period  by  any  of  his  daily  duties, 
he  enters  the  day  with  the  heartening  sense  that 
the  hardest  is  past,  that  he  has  voluntarily,  for 
health  of  body's  sake  and  strength  of  will's  sake, 
demanded  of  himself  more  than  others  will  require 
of  him.  Not  only  does  this  simple  rule  rob  the 
day  of  much  of  the  dread  of  the  hard  things  which 
are  coming,  but  it  is  one  of  the  best  remedies  for 
procrastination,  for  the  habit  of  pushing  the  un- 
pleasant or  the  disagreeable  ahead;  and  it  makes 
for  the  development  of  genuine  will  power  of  high 
quality. 

If  the  business  of  will  repair  is  a  seriously 
needed  one,  an  additional  help  to  the  right  starting 
of  the  day  will  be  secured  through  the  habit  of 
daily  selection  of  some  short  task,  some  duty  not 
entirely  agreeable,  some  sacrifice  demanding 
effort,  some  act  of  thoughtfulness  requiring 
denial,  setting  aside  a  brief  period  of  study,  the 
reading  of  a  page  or  a  chapter,  the  memorising 
of  a  few  lines,  the  fifteen  minutes  at  the  dictionary 
or  encyclopedia — some  activity  not  demanded  by 
our  regular  duties,  which  we  resolve  to  accomplish 
before  retiring.  Some  of  the  world's  most  effi- 
cient workers  ascribe  their  success  to  this  daily 


222        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

habit  of  designating  a  certain  stint  of  work,  which 
they  accomplish,  even  though  it  means  the  "wee, 
sma'  hours. " 

Willing  Decision. — The  day-dreamer  is  usually 
will-less.  The  character  in  which  wishing  to  any 
extent  displaces  willing  courts  the  loss  of  its 
volitional  back-bone.  Wishing  must  be  trans- 
formed into  willing,  dreaming  into  doing,  before 
that  force  can  be  attained  which  makes  vigorous, 
productive,  or  even  self-sustaining  manhood  pos- 
sible. But  need  of  wills  is  not  at  all  limited  to 
the  masculine  gender.  Dreamy,  dreary  indolence, 
and  will-less,  sentimental  wish-weakness  are  com- 
mon demoralisers  of  womanhood — and  nervous- 
ness grows  apace  in  such  an  atmosphere.  Feel- 
ing-fog, and  dismal  anticipations,  and  cloudiness 
of  purpose,  which  clutter  the  mind,  may  be  cleared 
away  through  earnest  will  activity.  The  will 
which  demands  a  prompt  doing  of  the  duty  which 
is  always  at  hand,  which  resolutely  refuses  to 
listen  to  the  questionings  and  doubts  and  uncer- 
tainties of  inaccurate  feeling-suggestion,  is  the 
kind  of  will  which,  when  attained,  proves  the 
needed  saving  force  for  many  a  neurotic  who  has 
become  mired  by  the  habitual  acceptance  of  the 
decisions  of  inertia. 

Many,  who  have  for  years  been  comfortably 
clear  thinkers,  like  others  who  have  never  trained 
themselves  into  logical  habits  of  reasoning,  when 
they  become  toxic  and  their  nerves  go  wrong,  find 
difficulty  in  reaching  decisions.  There  is  a  dis- 
tinct difference  between  the  act  of  decision  of 
effort — meaning  the  one  in  which  choice  is  directed 


WILLING  WILLS  223 

along  the  line  of  greatest  resistance — and  that 
miserable  indecision  which  fairly  burns  up  the 
strength  of  resolve  and  principle,  through  the 
often  hopeless  effort  to  reach  a  conclusion  which 
will  satisfy  the  doubting,  questioning,  fearing 
mind.  Weakened  wills  ever  find  energy  loss 
through  their  inability  to  decide,  for  will  is  the 
mind's  basis  of  decision,  as  well  as  of  execution; 
and  as  has  been  repeatedly  asserted  in  foregoing 
chapters,  it  is  will,  not  feeling,  that  must  control ; 
duty,  not  desire,  that  must  lead;  purpose  and 
principle,  and  not  pleasure,  that  must  dominate. 
When  indecision  has  become  at  all  rampant,  will 
power  may  be  rapidly  quickened  through  a  few 
weeks  of  systematic  choosing  of  the  disagreeable. 
To  be  able  to  deliberately  select  the  uncomfortable 
when  comforts  are  wooing,  to  assert  the  personal 
superiority  to  nagging  conditions  and  perverse 
things,  go  far  toward  clearing  the  mind  of  the 
smudge  of  indecision.  Impatience,  irritability, 
even  fierce-burning  anger,  are  the  reactions  of 
many  to  even  small  and  immaterial  inconven- 
iences. The  ability  to  greet  these  minor  interfer- 
ences with  asserted  serenity,  with  even  a  bit  of 
welcome,  proves  quite  disconcerting  to  not  only 
the  inconvenience  itself,  but  to  its  attending  im- 
patience. How  spontaneously  do  we  doff  our  hats 
of  respect,  how  involuntarily  pay  homage  to  the 
unknown  knight  or  lady  who,  for  courtesy's  sake, 
for  gentility's  sake,  for  gentleness'  sake,  accepts 
personal  inconvenience  with  the  unassuming  con- 
sciousness of  noblesse  oblige. 

The  weakness  of  indecision  is  not  easily  over- 


224        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

come.  Until  clear  thinking  can  develop  convinc- 
ing judgments,  the  simplest  rule  to  be  adopted 
in  combating  this  conscienceless  thief  of  our 
energies  is  found  in  the  resolute  decision  to  de- 
cide— to  decide  even  with  the  risk  of  error,  the 
risk  of  starting  upon  the  wrong  road.  With  the 
defect  of  indecision,  with  its  depreciation  of 
strength  and  discounting  of  character,  the  will  to 
decide  at  any  hazard  must  be  forced.  One  can 
rarely  go  far  wrong  without  discovering  his  error, 
though  he  may  waver  indefinitely  between  this  and 
that  with  the  tedium  of  the  ever-swinging  pendu- 
lum, knowing  only  the  restlessness  and  waste  and 
loss  of  uncertainty,  and  never  the  rest  of  de- 
cision. Indecision  always  stands  for  effort,  deci- 
sion for  repose.  The  wrong  decision,  when  found 
to  be  wrong,  suggests  an  opposite  course  as  the 
right  one;  but  having  decided  wrong,  the  right 
solution  is  ever  closer  than  when  we  hopelessly 
turn  hither  and  yon,  hither  and  yon,  in  the  weak 
vacillation  of  indecision.  There  is  a  close  rela- 
tion between  conditions  of  painful  indecision  and 
the  nervous  tension  of  chronic,  irritating  auto- 
intoxication. 

In  cultivating  the  ability  to  will  prompt  and 
abiding  decisions,  a  return  to  simplicity  is  fre- 
quently essential  for  the  nervously-disturbed 
mind.  Much  confusion  and  inability  to  reason 
conclusively  grows  out  of  the  richly-varied  choice 
of  interests  now  presented  to  all.  Many  are  try- 
ing to  cover  too  much  ground,  trying  to  be  aggres- 
sively progressive,  stretching  their  energy  over  so 
broad  a  surface  that  their  attention  has  become 


WILLING  WILLS  225 

dangerously  thin,  and  sooner  or  later  indecision 
grips  the  mind.  The  decision  adhered  to,  to  do 
one  thing  well,  even  a  simple  thing,  forms  a 
nucleus  which,  while  small,  can  be  rolled  as  the 
snowball  into  immense  proportions;  for,  as  snow 
to  snow,  so  will  good  adhere  to  good.  Unfor- 
tunately, those  who  have  serious  will  defects  be- 
come helpless,  as  far  as  any  prospect  of  self- 
discipline  is  concerned.  Their  spasmodic  efforts 
at  mastery  are  doomed  to  defeat  by  the  weakness 
inherent  in  the  very  mind  that  conceives  them. 
Particularly  is  this  true  in  those  whose  defective 
habits  have  caused  indulgence  in  drink  or  drugs, 
or  prolonged  damage  from  physical  or  mental 
toxins.  For  these,  discipline  from  without  must 
be  used  during  weeks  or  months,  which,  with 
appropriate  physical  training  and  restoration, 
and  the  introduction  of  some  worthy  motive  into 
life,  constitute  the  only  principles  upon  which  last- 
ing salvation  from  the  weaknesses  of  self  may  be 
achieved.  Many  psychasthenics,  neurasthenics 
and  hysterics  are  sadly  defective  in  will,  and 
should  surrender  absolutely  to  the  mind  that 
knows,  to  the  will  which  can  guide,  to  the  character 
which  can  inspire,  until  atrophied  will  has  been 
restored.  There  are  nervous  weaklings  for  whom 
health  of  mind  or  body  is  impossible  unless  com- 
pelled from  without. 

Willing  Control. — The  seriousness  and  help- 
lessness of  the  condition  of  many  of  the  nervous 
is  due  to  the  unfortunate  fact  that  exhaustion  of 
nervous  energy  usually  reduces  will  power;  con- 
sequently, the  very  motive  force  which  is  essential 


226        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

to  rapid  recovery  is  lacking.  Again,  surrender 
to  the  temporary  control  of  one  who  has  mastered 
the  art  of  nervous  reeducation  offers  the  quickest 
solution  of  the  problem.  We  have  already  seen 
that  will's  first  battles  are  with  its  hereditary 
enemies,  indolence,  fear,  anger,  hate  and  selfish 
wilfulness;  therefore,  though  volition's  most  con- 
sistent slogan  should  be  "I  will,"  it  must  also 
learn  the  saving  power  of  the  insistent  "No." 
All  strife  is  a  combination  of  attack  and  defence. 
Most  successful  battles  are  won  through  energetic 
and  forceful  aggressiveness,  but  defence  is  fre- 
quently as  essential  as  offence ;  and  in  reply  to  the 
insistent  demands  of  inclination,  which  would 
keep  us  ever  lagging  behind  the  leadership  of 
our  ideals,  inhibition,  with  the  power  to  resist,  to 
say  "No"  and  again  "No,"  must  be  developed. 
Man  faces  a  thousand  practical  situations  in  which 
the  hard,  the  cold,  sometimes  the  bitter  "No" 
must  be  said.  Again,  the  immense  cumulative 
power  of  daily  small  acts  in  producing  habits 
which  become  ultimately  storm-proof,  is  in  evi- 
dence. A  few  minutes'  introspection  will  reveal 
to  all  unworthy  tendencies  which  should  be  denied. 
The  teacher,  the  employer,  the  parent,  may  resist 
the  temptation  to  impatient  response  to  the 
"dumb-fool  question."  The  employee,  the  serv- 
ant, the  less  fortunate  neighbour,  may  put  into 
daily  operation  the  determination  to  withhold  the 
damaging,  critical  comment.  All  youth  will  add 
immeasurably  to  ease  and  productiveness  of  liv- 
ing through  a  resolute  negation  of  the  importuni- 
ties of  anger  to  vivid  and  emphatic  expression. 


WILLING  WILLS  227 

Learning  the  opportune  use  of  the  powerful  little 
word  "No,"  when  the  meaner  qualities  of  self 
attempt  to  dictate  action,  will  develop  a  power 
of  control  sufficient  to  save  many  from  future 
nervous  failure. 

Bad  nervous  habits  form  rapidly  in  the  face  of 
will  surrender.  They  constantly  add  to  the  load 
which  the  nervous  of  all  types  carry,  and  in  the 
breaking  of  such  habits  much  can  be  done  to 
strengthen  the  armour  of  resistance.  Just  as 
mind  and  body  have  no  greater  conserver  of  their 
forces,  no  means  of  multiplying  their  strength 
equal  to  will-formed  habits,  so  the  subject  of  auto- 
matic poor  habits,  acquired  through  the  indolence 
of  passive  will  action,  is  constantly  wasting  will 
force  in  an  effortful  doing  of  life's  ordinary 
duties — actions  which  should  long  since  have  be- 
come spontaneous.  The  poor  workman,  an  un- 
fitted square  peg,  plodding  and  industrious  but 
inaccurate,  attempting  that  which  he  has  not  the 
training  or  capacity  to  accomplish,  the  careless 
and  negligent,  the  thoughtless  and  unobservant, 
all  blunder  along  through  life,  objects  of  criticism 
and  rebuke,  sarcasm  and  ridicule.  Growing 
resentful,  irritable,  remorseful,  they  leak  energy 
through  fear  of  having  poorly  done,  through  im- 
patience at  the  criticism  and  condemnation  of 
their  work ;  they  are  wretched  through  their  mis- 
taken feeling  of  injustice  in  the  lack  of  an  un- 
earned recognition. 

Along  few  lines  do  the  nervous  need  a  widening 
of  their  margins  more  than  in  their  resistance 
to  lesser  pains  and  discomforts.  The  temptation 


228        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

to  overprotection  of  self  is  almost  inherent  in 
the  nervous  temperament,  and  with  the  nervously 
diseased  an  infinite  amount  of  waste  force  is 
directed  toward  the  avoidance  of  pain.  A  willing 
will  is  an  absolute  necessity  in  developing  that 
control  which  puts  the  nervous  beyond  the  domina- 
tion and  ultimate  damnation  of  drugs  and  stimu- 
lants. It  does  require  more  than  the  average  will 
to  resolutely  turn  from  discomfort  to  duty,  from 
pain  to  practical  effort,  yet  this  is  a  saving  power 
which,  when  acquired,  should  forever  settle  in 
the  life  of  the  nervous  the  question  of  "  doping " 
or  doing.  The  margin  of  resistance  can  profit- 
ably be  pushed  beyond  the  suggestive  power  of 
the  average  headache,  the  periodic  discomfort,  or 
the  "no  'count "  feeling.  A  moderate  amount  of 
pain  should  be  no  enemy  to  the  will;  the  average 
will  should  possess  the  power  to  convert  many 
minor  ills  into  strengthening  allies ;  the  mind  finds 
daily  opportunities  for  willing  control  in  the  con- 
stant reappearance  of  inclination,  while  the  sur- 
render to  indulgence  through  the  simple  insistence 
of  inclination  stands  for  a  weakness  which  can 
only  lead  on  to  disaster,  large  or  small.  Yet 
there  is  no  reason  why  indulgence  should  not  be 
chosen  on  occasion,  when  it  does  not  interfere  with 
higher  demands ;  but  for  him  who  would  own  him- 
self and  not  be  controlled  by  any  of  his  unworthy 
servants,  such  indulgence  should  be  the  result  of 
a  deliberate  choice,  and  never  of  drifting  decision. 
One  of  the  higher  developments  in  the  volitional 
life  rarely  considered  by  the  thoughtless,  and 
usually  actively  avoided  by  the  weak  of  will,  is 


WILLING  WILLS  229 

that  rare  power  of  transforming  dislikes  into 
likes.  Each  developed  dislike  may  prove  a  centre 
for  softening  of  character;  while  each  dislike 
transformed  into  a  like  is  an  added  nucleus,  about 
which  to  accumulate  character  strength. 

Fear  enshrouds  some  lives  with  the  sinister  and 
threatening.  Situations  occur  from  which  the 
majority  turn  and  flee,  or  slink  away;  and  in 
attaining  that  will  which  stamps  its  owner  as 
one  of  superior  fibre,  such  apparitions  will  be 
faced.  Sad  is  the  life  which  has  dragged  through 
agonised  years  of  misery,  avoiding  some  fright- 
fulness  which  has  never  come;  but  in  resolutely 
facing  this  demoralising  phantom,  the  physical 
hurt  or  the  temporary  shame  is  found  less  dis- 
counting to  nervous  integrity  than  the  prolonged 
surrender  to  the  cowardice  of  fear.  Such  asser- 
tion arouses  the  self  that  saves.  There  is  one 
healing  power  of  the  will,  a  veritable  elixir  of 
life,  that  power  which  fixes  its  mind  on  the  best, 
which  wills  health,  and  works  for  health.  Such 
power  can  never  be  developed  until  the  ability 
to  will  control,  and  maintain  it,  has  been  secured. 

For  the  tense,  the  power  of  relaxation  can  only 
come  through  willed  self-forgetfulness.  The  sim- 
ple ability  to  give  up  for  the  five-minute  period 
all  thought  of  strife,  to  lie  upon  the  couch  inert, 
can  be  gradually  developed  into  the  power  of 
potent  relaxation.  In  tension  there  is  constant 
leakage,  a  leakage  which  ultimately  lessens  will 
power ;  while  in  rational  relaxation  there  is  a  con- 
servation of  strength  which  results  in  a  beneficent 
cycle — force  is  added  to  will,  and  force  of  will 


230        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

increases  the  power  of  relaxation.  In  such  power 
we  discern  the  soluton  of  the  problem  of  sleep- 
lessness. 

Food  self-poisoning  usually  forms  the  back- 
ground for  the  irritating  physical  stimulation 
which  repels  sleep,  and  a  food-exercise  readjust- 
ment is  essential  to  cure.  Only  less  common  is 
the  mental  irritant — the  restless  whip  of  Worry 
— defying  the  call  of  physical  rest,  and  relaxation 
of  mind.  But  a  few  nights  of  toxic-worry-sleep- 
lessness, and  the  nervously  susceptible  is  im- 
pressed with  the  certainty  of  his  insomnia.  Now 
is  the  stage  fully  set  for  the  growing  months  of 
poor  sleep,  when  the  labours  of  the  day  are  only 
less  exhausting  than  the  hopeless  strivings  of  the 
night.  Thus  is  formed  the  habit,  which  can  only 
multiply  the  sleepless  hours,  the  habit  of  adjust- 
ing the  plans  and  activities  of  the  day  to  the  single 
end — that  sleep  thereby  may  be  assured.  But  the 
very  intensity  of  effort  to  secure  sleep  creates  a 
mental  tension  which  is  sleep's  greatest  enemy. 
The  sufferer  is  now  ready  for  a  further  step  in 
his  nervous  demoralisation — the  resort  to  the 
sleep  potion.  There  is  no  drug,  sufficiently  power- 
ful to  produce  artificial  sleep,  which  is  not  a  poison 
to  the  sensitive  brain  protoplasm.  In  times  of 
extreme  stress  or  illness,  the  physician  may 
wisely  prescribe  a  sleep-mixture  as  a  temporary 
emergency  measure.  Nevertheless,  for  the  nerv- 
ous, each  night  of  drug-sleep  is  a  stride  deeper 
into  the  mire  of  helplessness.  On  the  other  hand, 
by  wise  eating,  potent  muscular  fatigue,  worry- 
shunning  thought-selection  and  righteously  at- 


WILLING  WILLS  231 

tained  relaxation,  the  normal  sleep  which  "  knits 
up  the  ravel 'd  sleeve  of  care"  may  be  attained 
by  all  not  organically  damaged. 

The  thoughtful  reader  has  long  since  divined 
the  essential  and  fundamental  truth  that  nervous 
cure  is  self-cure.  The  specialist  does  not  give  a 
magic  potion  which  acts  as  the  fabled  Fountain 
of  Youth ;  there  is  no  magnetic  touch  to  recall  force 
of  nerve  or  stability  of  thought  wasted  through 
excess  or  neglect;  the  mental  healer  knows  no 
mystic  word  which  is  a  talisman  to  draw  from 
the  depths  of  space  miraculous  forces  to  reju- 
venate the  jaded.  Powder  and  pill  are  usually 
but  makeshifts,  more  or  less  weakly  or  harmfully 
modifying  symptoms  only.  Elaborate  courses  of 
treatment  which  demand  of  the  patient  no  ex- 
penditure of  creative  effort,  and  prolonged, 
diversion-seeking  trips  offer  nothing  but  the 
superficial  cure  of  a  rest  which  has  in  no  way  in- 
creased the  strength-producing,  resistance-form- 
ing faculties  of  body  or  mind.  The  cured  nervous 
patient  is  he  who  knows  not  frequent  relapse,  he 
who  recognises  in  his  superb  nervous  tempera- 
ment one  of  the  greatest  assets  of  living,  who 
feels  a  thrill  of  doing,  and  sacrificing,  and  over- 
coming. Such  a  cure  is,  and  can  only  be,  self- 
cure.  Abiding  self-cure  embraces  conscious  su- 
premacy— a  supremacy  based  upon  unyielding 
resolution  to  accomplish  to  the  limit  of  a  properly 
conserved  and  developed  self;  and  upon  that 
higher  resolution  of  essential  resignation,  a 
resignation  which  accepts  the  inevitable  with  its 
hidden  message  of  inspiration. 


CHAPTEE  XVII 
OUR  MORAL  SELVES 

The  Moral  Nature. — The  problem  of  living 
would  be  relatively  simple  were  it  limited  to  our 
observance  of  the  physical  and  chemical  laws 
governing  the  body,  and  the  practical,  work-a-day 
principles  of  psychology  and  logic.  But  the 
developing  personality  early  feels  the  tug  of  a 
new  and  complicating  force  of  existence,  a  hidden 
yet  intense  influence  which  he  calls  his  better 
nature.  Ever  after  the  birth  of  his  so-called 
moral  self,  all  relations,  plans,  hopes  and  fears, 
expressed  in  conduct,  or  hidden  in  thought  or  feel- 
ing, become  accountable  to  this  ever-changing 
standard. 

In  our  study  of  the  physical  causes  and  treat- 
ment of  nervousness,  it  was  found  that  a  few 
comparatively  simple  departures  from  definite 
and  easily-recognised  laws  accounted  for  most 
disorders  from  this  source.  The  mental  causes 
were  more  numerous  and  complex,  but  still  cap- 
able of  relatively  clear  systematisation.  But  as 
we  enter  upon  the  final  section  of  our  studies  in 
the  reeducation  of  the  nervous,  and  are  forced 
to  face  that  indefinite  sea  of  possibilities  of  con- 
duct, with  the  recognition  that,  in  a  way,  every 
character  is  a  law  to  himself,  the  complexities  of 

232 


OUR  MORAL  SELVES  233 

moral  adjustment  appear  appalling,  and  the  prob- 
ability of  arriving  at  sane  and  wholesome  and 
helpful  practical  conclusions  appears  remote.  It 
seems  that  the  moral  nature  itself  embraces  all 
of  the  mind's  complexities,  infinitely  increased  by 
the  multiples  of  right  and  wrong,  expediency  and 
necessity,  intention  and  impulse.  The  head- 
hunter  spends  weeks  of  tense  impatience  in  am- 
bush, awaiting  an  opportunity  to  slay  and  behead 
any  innocent  member  of  the  tribe  of  his  hereditary 
enemies.  Successful,  he  returns  to  his  village, 
thrilled  and  joyous,  proudly  bearing  his  gruesome 
trophy ;  and,  greeted  with  the  acclaim  and  congrat- 
ulations of  his  tribesmen,  takes  to  his  hut  the 
bride  for  whom  he  has  so  long  risked  and  waited, 
but  who  spurned  him  until  he  could  lay  at  her 
feet  this  token  of  his  prowess.  Her  standard  of 
morality  would  have  forced  her  to  live  and  die 
unwed  and  childless,  rather  than  give  herself  to 
one  whom  we  denote  a  sneaking,  brutal,  remorse- 
less murderer.  How  different  the  bride  with  the 
missionary  ideal!  She  leaves  home,  civilisation, 
comforts  and  culture,  with  the  man  of  her  choice, 
because  he  is  possessed  of  that  spirit  of  sacrifice 
which  makes  him  willing  to  give  strength  and 
health,  and  life  itself  perchance,  that  a  few  beams 
of  higher  morality  may  enter  the  lives  of  these 
same  benighted,  virtuous  murderers.  Each  bride 
has  made  her  choice  and  cast  her  lot  upon  the 
basis  of  moral  standards,  but  what  an  infinity 
separates  their  ideals!  In  a  sense,  this  very 
infinity  of  moral  variability  exists  in  every  de- 
veloped character, 


234       THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

From  this  complexity  of  possible  moral  varia- 
tions, practical  simplicity  appears  when  basic 
groupings  are  made;  thus  morality  may  be  help- 
fully reduced  to  three  fundamental  forms.  The 
morality  of  the  child,  of  the  head-hunter,  of  all 
primitive  minds  and  races,  is  that  of  fear — fear- 
morality  growing  out  of  the  instinct  of  self- 
preservation.  This  grade  of  morality  has  ever 
been,  and  will  continue  for  many  generations  to 
be,  the  only  moral  force  which  can  restrain  many, 
or  compel  their  conduct  and  turn  it  away  from 
the  brutally,  instinctively  selfish.  Even  in  homes 
of  carefully  taught  and  earnestly  lived  high 
standards,  the  individual  will  be  found  who  is 
incapable  of  being  controlled  along  moral  lines 
by  any  other  influence  than  fear.  Scientifically, 
these  unfortunates  are  regarded  as  examples  of 
arrested  moral  development. 

The  average  standard  of  morality  may  be 
termed  utilitarian,  and  is  based  upon  the  attain- 
ment of  so-called  practical  ends.  "An  eye  for  an 
eye  and  a  tooth  for  a  tooth, "  "Live  and  let  live;" 
the  common  relation  between  employer  and  em- 
ployee— a  carefully  measured  return  of  service 
for  an  accurately  discriminated  wage;  the  right- 
eousness of  " justice ;"  the  "square  deal;"  our 
conception  of  "fair  play;"  the  great  bulk  of 
ethics  governing  man's  relations  to  man — are  all 
based  upon  this  standard,  which,  when  fulfilled, 
answers  the  demands  of  the  average  conscience. 

Idealistic  morality,  the  final  classification,  is 
frequently  termed  "impracticable,"  and  those 
who  follow  its  leadings  "too  good  for  this  life," 


OUR  MORAL  SELVES  235 

Yet  civilisation  produces  few  who  have  not 
attained  some  ideal  morality,  who  have  not  had 
some  vision  of  gain  not  expressed  in  comfort  of 
body,  or  broadening  acres,  or  multiplied  chattels, 
in  stocks  and  bonds  or  increase  of  bank  credit. 
Especially  rare  is  it  to  find  the  nature  sufficiently 
responsive  to  belong  to  the  nervous  temperament, 
who  has  not  felt  the  thrill  of  inspiration,  who 
has  not  touched  power,  or  beauty,  or  nobility  in 
his  ideals,  who  has  not  dreamed  dreams  and  seen 
visions  that  would  lead  him  away  from  craven 
fear,  above  mediocre  practicability,  toward  the 
realm  of  soul  greatness. 

All  morality,  no  matter  what  its  grade  or  incen- 
tive, is  a  fight  of  the  relatively  good  with  the 
relatively  better.  All  morality  lays  a  restraining 
hand  upon  the  present  that  the  future  may  attain 
increase.  For  any  individual,  moral  living  is  the 
art  of  living  up  to  his  highest  standards,  is  the 
doing  the  best  he  knows.  For  every  individual, 
crooked  thinking  when  clear  thinking  is  possible, 
ugly  emotions  when  harmonious  feeling  is  known, 
and  weak  and  ill  willing  after  active  and  resolute 
willing  have  been  conceived,  stand  for  immoral 
living.  The  entire  sphere  of  human  conduct  com- 
ing under  the  discriminations  of  right  and  wrong 
is  included  under  the  term  morality.  Here  we 
note  the  ever-ascending  scale  of  time.  Augustine, 
devout  and  sainted,  was  a  leader  and  guide  of 
religious  thought  and  conduct  in  his  time,  but 
to-day  his  standards  of  morality  would  make  him 
"  impossible. "  Morality  answers  the  ever- reiter- 
ated "why"  of  conduct,  morality  searchingly 


236        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

questions  the  "how"  of  all  plans.  Intellect 
selects  the  object  of  attention,  will  holds  fast 
thereto,  but  morality  dictates  the  choice  of  selec- 
tion and  attention.  It  abides  in  that  mysterious 
"Holy  of  Holies "  of  our  souls,  deep  down  where 
swiftly,  silently,  fatefully,  work  our  purposes  of 
will  and  choice. 

It  is  given  ideas  to  crystallise  into  ideals,  and 
clear-thinking  ideals  guide  our  morals.  Thus 
there  should  be  a  close  relation  between  education 
and  morality.  But  highly-developed  intellect  may 
be  coldly  unmoral  or  foully  immoral,  for  our  moral 
nature  is  ever  more  than  intellect.  It  is  intellect 's 
censor  and  guide,  giving  direction  to  thought, 
ever  moulding  the  expression  of  emotion,  keenly 
alert  to  warn  and  direct  the  will.  The  moral 
self  thus  enters  into  every  relation  of  life.  Man's 
attitude  toward  his  surroundings  and  to  his  inner 
self  constitutes  two  widely  separated  manifesta- 
tions of  his  moral  nature.  It  finds  constant  and 
far-reaching  expression  in  the  conduct  which 
marks  his  reactions  to  the  infinitude  of  persons 
and  things.  Here  it  is  ever  being  influenced  by 
the  customs  and  habits  and  standards  of  society, 
or  firmly  moulded  or  sternly  rebuked  by  the  man- 
dates of  law,  for  rare  is  the  individual  who  is 
not  constantly  stimulated  or  restrained  by  social 
and  penal  influences.  But  humanity,  numberless 
as  the  sands  of  the  sea,  and  the  bewildering  con- 
glomerate of  things,  are  but  limited  in  scope  when 
compared  to  the  truly  limitless  fields  of  self  over 
which  our  moral  nature  may  attain  supreme  com- 
mand, or  entangled  and  confused,  grope  wildly  or 


OUR  MORAL  SELVES  237 

weakly,   or  beaten,   may   grovel   in   humiliating 
servitude. 

While  human  nature  has  ever  failed  to  ade- 
quately realise  in  practical  living  the  moral  lead- 
ings of  the  soul,  it  has  never  failed  to  reach  up 
for  the  something  better  than  self.  Mankind  is 
essentially  religious,  and  when  morality  recognises 
a  motive  above  the  selfish  it  becomes  religious. 
Keligion  is  morality  seeking  direction  through  the 
inspiration  of  the  unseen.  In  seeking  this  un- 
seen, the  human  mind  has  ventured  into  ten  thou- 
sand recesses,  and  dragged  from  the  void  of 
imagination  and  given  form  in  wood  and  stone, 
in  sculpture  or  effigy,  in  doctrine  or  creed,  in  sect 
or  belief,  to  as  many  representations.  Eeligion 
has  terrified,  coerced,  stultified,  wooed,  directed, 
thrilled,  inspired  and  saved.  False  religions  have 
tortured,  and  the  truest  religions,  misused,  have 
tortured,  too;  for  religion  has  all  too  frequently 
dispensed  with  morality,  and  the  crimes  done 
in  its  name — the  name  which  should  stand  for 
the  highest  blessing  of  existence — are  untellable. 
Even  to-day,  religion  is  used  by  too  many  as  a 
convenience,  a  cloak,  making  possible  a  comfort- 
able continuance  of  immoral  habits,  a  spiritual 
lightning-rod  to  protect  them  from  the  effects  of 
conscious  evil-doing.  Almost  equally  blind  is  the 
effort  of  morality  to  dispense  with  religion.  The 
soul  is  not  satisfied  with  the  bread  of  its  own 
making;  it  only  thrives  on  the  manna  from  some 
heaven.  Thoughtless  indeed  is  he  who  has  not 
recognised  that  life  is  a  developmental  process, 
that  man  is  here  to  be  changed.  We  take  our- 


238        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

selves  seriously  through  all  our  seven  ages,  from 
"mewling  infant"  to  "sans  teeth,  sans  eyes,  sans 
taste,  sans  everything, "  and  prepare  for  and 
accept  the  inevitable  flow  and  ebb  of  the  physical ; 
but  too  often  we  ignore  our  inner  self,  our  vital 
self,  and  our  attendant  Nemesis,  failing  to  realise 
that  our  moral  nature  is  our  only  possession  cap- 
able of  eternal  adjustments.  Our  body's  needs, 
our  mind's  abilities,  chain  our  attention  and  hold 
fast  our  devotion,  until,  as  Huxley  said,  "Clever 
men  are  as  common  as  blackberries;  the  rare 
thing  is  to  find  a  good  one. ' '  And  Tyndall,  mate- 
rialistic physicist,  steeped  in  the  atheism  of  his 
day,  recognises  this  same  need  in  his  statement, 
"There  is  a  thing  of  more  value  than  science: 
it  is  nobility  of  character." 

Within  man's  moral  nature,  within  his  com- 
monly called  spiritual  self,  abides  a  power  deeper 
than  life  itself — a  power  which  can  reign  inde- 
pendent of  surroundings,  which  can  thrive  in  a 
quagmire  of  immorality,  grow  and  glow  in  the 
midst  of  vileness  and  filth  of  word  and  act,  live 
steadfast  and  kindly  when  surrounded  by  resent- 
ment and  misunderstanding  and  injustice,  remain 
serene  and  strong  when  assailed  by  loss  and  dis- 
aster, when  heart-love  has  been  crushed,  fortunes 
snatched  away,  and  reputation  assailed  and 
bedraggled.  Within  the  moral  nature  abides  the 
power  to  assimilate  the  assaults  of  life,  to  trans- 
mute suffering  of  body,  mind  and  soul  into  per- 
severance, patience,  charity  and  victory. 

Morals  and  Nervous  Health. — Religion  and 
medicine  have  'been  unfavourably,  and  often  det- 


OUR  MORAL  SELVES  239 

rimentally,  associated  through  the  varying  for- 
tunes of  humanity,  and  to-day,  in  spite  of  certain 
fairly  successful  combinations,  these  two  forces 
for  man's  good  are  still  respectfully  requesting 
each  other  to  "tend  to  its  own  affairs."  It  has 
been  Beligion's  habit  to  preempt  all  available 
morality,  and  Medicine  has  had,  goodness  knows, 
problems  enough  of  a  purely  material  sort  to  keep 
her  busy  these  last  enlightened  generations.  But 
Medicine  has  donned  the  seven-league  boots,  and 
is  coming  to  her  own  with  marvellous  strides. 
The  accuracies  of  medical  science  work  each  day 
ten  thousand  miracles  in  the  saving  of  life  and 
limb,  in  dulling  the  tooth  of  suffering,  in  the  anni- 
hilation of  plague  and  pestilence,  in  causing  the 
very  hand  of  death  to  hesitate. 

Science  has  satisfied  the  medical  mind  through 
its  clear  and  definite  solutions  of  a  growing  list 
of  practical  problems  vitally  concerning  the  physi- 
cal well-being  of  human  kind.  And  until  quite 
recently,  since  broadening  Science  herself  has 
recognised  the  impossible  limitations  and  conse- 
quent untenability  of  its  former  materialism. 
Medicine  has  refused  to  see  any  reasons  for 
troubling  herself  with  the  metaphysical.  There 
were  plenty  of  theories  attempting  to  explain 
nervousness  upon  physical  or  mental  grounds, 
obviating  any  need  for  recognition  of  the  so-called 
spiritual.  Even  to-day,  few  medical  teachers 
refer  to,  even  if  they  accept,  the  tremendous  in- 
fluence of  the  moral  self  in  producing  nervous 
illness.  That  wonderful  inner  self  which  chooses 
from  life's  accumulated  thoughts,  realisations, 


240       THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

memories  and  desires,  and  which  uses  the  powers 
of  will,  hope  and  belief,  constitutes  man's  sole 
possession  from  birth  to  death,  a  superb  treasure, 
which  he  can  use  or  abuse  in  a  thousand  ways. 
His  mind  is  a  gift  which  he  may  develop,  en- 
hance, beautify;  but  his  character  is  a  victory. 
Character  is  not  innate.  It  is  born  in  the  midst 
of  effort  and  strife,  in  the  determined  rebound 
from  depression  and  reaction  from  the  falls  which 
are  certain  in  the  press  and  choke  of  the  work 
of  shop,  field  and  mart ;  it  is  a  product  of  the  vic- 
tories won  in  those  struggles  for  perfection  which 
are  the  battles  of  choice  for  all  worthy  souls. 

The  nervous  character  is  by  nature  a  moral 
character.  The  highly  adaptable  nervous  tem- 
perament, ever  responsive  and  responding,  is 
inherently  the  most  keenly  attuned  to  the  whis- 
perings of  the  "  still,  small  voice ;"  while  much 
of  the  suffering  of  the  neurotic  testifies  to  the 
keen  sensitiveness  of  his  moral  nature.  We  have 
seen  how  man's  physical  toxins  torture  his  body, 
tangle  his  thoughts  and  disorganise  his  nervous 
wholeness.  But  in  his  moral  nature  he  possesses 
an  irresistible,  stabilising  and  equalising  power, 
capable  of  assimilating  most  physical  and  mental 
disturbances,  and  of  keeping  his  nature  true  to 
his  conceptions  of  right,  even  in  the  face  of  insist- 
ent calls  to  surrender.  Within  the  developed 
moral  self  abides  a  force  which  can  lift  the  char- 
acter above  the  narrowness  of  ignorance,  can  pro- 
tect from  the  disaster  of  impulse,  can  convert 
complaints  into  approbation,  can  rouse  and  in- 
vigorate indolence  and  indifference,  and  shame 


OUR  MORAL  SELVES  241 

dishonesty  and  sefishness  into  honour  and 
thoughtfulness,  can  rob  drudgery  of  all  semblance 
of  slavishness,  and  sweeten  the  bitterest  tears 
of  remorse. 

In  our  final  analysis,  nervous  illness  presents 
a  problem  which  is  fundamentally  moral.  Earely 
will  one  suffering  nervously  be  found  in  whom 
some  damaging  moral  defect  is  not  present,  ever 
adding  its  venom  to  physical  and  mental  toxins. 
The  whole  question  of  human  attitude  resides  in 
the  moral  self.  Unworthy  attitudes  can  decimate 
ease,  poise,  comfort  and  satisfaction  in  the  physi- 
cally strong  and  in  those  otherwise  mentally  well- 
balanced  ;  just  as  the  wholesome  attitudes  heal  the 
wounds  of  conflict,  and  brighten  and  lighten  the 
dark  days  of  failure,  and  bring  the  ray  of  hope  or 
the  support  of  faith  into  all  those  relations  which 
would  otherwise  be  empty  of  good. 

Neurasthenia,  psychasthenia,  hypochondriasis, 
hysteria,  alcoholism,  drug  addictions,  all  are  based 
upon  certain  moral  problems,  and  as  these  dis- 
orders increase  their  power  over  the  individual, 
the  moral  effects  they  produce  become  more  and 
more  evident,  until  one  rarely  meets  an  extreme 
sufferer  of  such  nervous  disturbances  in  whom 
most  idealistic,  and  even  utilitarian  morality,  has 
not  been  defeated.  In  many  such  lives,  moral 
wretchedness  is  evidenced  by  the  development  of 
a  selfishness  which  becomes  dominant,  reckless 
and  insatiable.  The  best  and  the  worst  of  man 
will  ever  be  expressed  through  his  moral  nature. 
The  bare  soul  of  the  neurotic  who  has  surrendered 
to  unwholesome  attitude,  to  unworthiness  of 


242        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

thought  and  desire,  to  literal  demoralisation,  is 
one  of  humanity's  sad  spectacles.  He  has  relin- 
quished that  touch  of  divinity  which  would  ever 
lead  man  upward,  which  never  ceases  to  plead 
that  he  choose  the  better  part,  even  as  he  slips 
deeper  and  deeper  into  the  quicksands  and  quag- 
mires of  sensation,  of  indolence  and  the  elemental 
passions. 

All  do  wrong,  all  make  mistakes,  all  sin  con- 
sciously, and  many  deliberately,  and  shame  and 
remorse  hang  as  mill-stones  about  many  hapless 
necks,  weights  dragging  them  further  and  further 
into  the  depths,  from  which,  to  the  defeated 
neurotic,  there  appears  no  power,  human  or  divine, 
to  deliver.  Unworthy  habits  lay  hold,  insinuat- 
ing, insistent,  mastering,  and  each  surrender  lets 
out  a  few  drops  of  the  blood  of  happiness,  and 
injects  remorse  or  shame  in  its  place.  A  moral 
sickness  becomes  chronic,  attended  with  depths  of 
suffering  unknown  to  mortal  illness,  and  dread 
and  recklessness  attend,  and  confidence  goes,  and 
a  nervous  illness  develops,  with  its  roots  sapping 
the  very  life  of  the  soul.  The  finer  the  nature, 
the  more  beautiful  the  ideals,  the  more  intense  the 
desires  for  right  living,  the  more  potent  is  evil 
thought,  wrong  attitude  and  the  hurt  of  shame 
in  robbing  character  of  its  freshness  and  poise 
and  worth,  and  reducing  it  to  a,  vassalage  of  dis- 
traught nerves. 

Again,  the  empty  soul's  restlessness  is  the 
enemy  to  nervous  peace.  Many  have  consistently 
failed  in  cultivating  worthy  thoughts  and  whole- 
some emotions,  have  sipped  of  life's  pleasures, 


OUR  MORAL  SELVES  243 

hither,  thither  and  yon,  have  known  but  shallow 
living  in  this  deep  life,  and,  reaching  the  full  tide 
of  maturity,  recognise  the  need  of  the  something 
lacking— a  need  which  they  have  not  the  will  nor 
the  inclination  to  replace.  Multitudes  of  well-to- 
do  women,  with  minds  but  superficially  equipped 
and  souls  more  empty  than  childhood's,  coveting 
attention  with  a  craving  which  knows  no  brooking, 
seek  professional  help  and  guidance  for  their 
multiform  nervous  illnesses,  while  in  their  empty 
moral  nature  is  a  defect  which  makes  seriously 
difficult  any  wholesome,  hopeful,  constructive  work 
toward  their  restoration.  Long  months  of  primi- 
tive physical,  mental  and  moral  reeducation,  dur- 
ing which  time  the  hands  and  mind  and  moral 
nature  become  acquainted  with  stern-visaged 
reality,  constitute  the  first  step  of  their  reforma- 
tion ;  and  in  place  of  the  void — the  hungry,  empty 
void,  with  its  cry  of  the  starving  soul — they  begin 
to  learn  how  good  life  really  is,  how  full  of  good 
it  is,  and  how  good  it  is  to  live. 

As  we  meet  the  joyous  life,  the  fragrantly 
happy  life  of  good  men  and  women,  most  of  whom 
have  not  been  blessed  with  a  superabundance  of 
this  world's  goods,  with  educations  frequently 
limited  to  the  "  three  B's,"  yet  able  to  look  calmly 
upon  the  frantic,  wearied  men  and  women  of  the 
world — the  children  of  fashion  and  wealth  and 
learning — with  steady,  comfortable,  sane  eyes,  the 
realisation  comes  strongly  that  their  joy  is  from 
an  inner  source;  the  realisation  should  come 
forcibly  that  the  moral  can  add  something  whole- 
somely, helpfully,  healingly  good  to  every  relation 


244       THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

of  life.  The  moral  eyes  see  clear  the  thoughts  and 
desires  and  willings  that  course  through  the  mind, 
and  pick  the  best,  ever  the  best. 

True  morality  demands  such  growth  as  will 
make  moral  action,  first,  a  deliberate,  ultimately, 
an  instinctive  choice,  in  which  attention  is  main- 
tained firmly  in  the  line  of  greatest  resistance. 
Worthy  morality  recognises  that  there  is  one 
truth  which  must  be  faced  by  every  living  soul — 
that  truth  which  stands  for  ultimate  destiny,  ex- 
pressed in  the  choice  of  self-denial  and  self- 
sacrifice  and  temporary  suffering  for  right's  sake, 
possible  only  through  religiously  idealised  mor- 
ality. 


CHAPTEE  XVIII 
REBELLION 

Defective  Adjustments. — Man's  almost  omnipo- 
tence becomes  forcibly  evident  when  we  realise 
how  bravely,  how  heroically,  he,  in  his  puny  weak- 
ness, has  faced  mighty  existence.  Physically  in- 
ferior to  scores  of  other  beings,  a  mere  puppet 
in  the  grip  of  elemental  forces,  he  has  ever  fought 
and  will  ever  fight  on  for  supremacy.  Campaign 
succeeds  campaign,  and  the  warfare  shows  no 
promise  of  ceasing.  Each  individual  life  early 
finds  itself  drafted  into  the  strife — the  strife  with 
surroundings,  with  inanimate  things  in  all  their 
profusion  and  confusion,  and  the  war  with  his 
kind — the  battles  of  opinion,  battles  of  taste, 
battles  for  bread,  battles  for  rights;  and  as  if 
this  were  not  enough,  he  finds  within  his  own  soul 
tendencies  and  instincts,  desires  and  temptations, 
with  which  he  must  do  constant  battle,  or  certain 
defeat  of  all  that  makes  for  success  in  existence 
is  fated.  Life  is  a  conflict  with  things  and  people, 
and  of  the  primitive  self  pitted  against,  not  his 
body,  but  his  soul.  The  victory  cannot  be  physi- 
cal, for  the  physical  is  doomed  to  relatively  early 
weakness  and  decay.  The  powers  of  the  mind, 
marvellous  as  they  are,  cannot  win  the  peace  that 
satisfies  the  inner  self.  The  only  adjustments 

245 


246        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

which  stand  out  above  the  conflicts  of  existence 
are  those  which  can  merit  the  "Well  done!"  of 
the  moral  self. 

It  is  a  mighty  existence.  Many  of  us  but  live 
on  its  edge.  Now  and  then  we  meet  the  full-souled 
man  or  woman  who,  we  realise,  has  ever  thought 
fairly  and  dealt  truly,  who  has  attained  a  philoso- 
phy which  assures  an  unchanging  power  of  pur- 
pose, a  life  of  serenity,  and  the  victory  of  peace. 
More  live  life  sadly,  galley  slaves  that  toil 
manacled  to  their  labours,  dejected,  sordid  things. 
Weak  of  face  and  of  spirit,  they  have  met  life 
only  to  surrender.  Still  others  take  it  all  hard, 
and  rebellion  chokes  the  joys  of  existence  with 
wild  impetuous  outbursts,  or  smothers  with  a 
smouldering  and  peace-destroying  fire.  Eebellion 
divides  life's  fighting  forces  into  groups,  waging 
wasteful  war  with  each  other.  It  separates  the 
individual  from  his  kind,  and  may  even  make  of 
him  an  outcast. 

Rebellion  is  one  of  the  commonest  defects  of 
adjustment.  Much  rebellion  is  based  on  igno- 
rance. Unquestionably  there  is  a  confusing 
babble  of  orders,  and  punishment  and  reprimand 
come  through  mistakes  honestly  made.  So  much 
that  is  elemental  within  man  bids  him  hither  or 
tempts  him  thither.  Instincts,  desires  and  im- 
pulses early  test  his  loyalty,  even  before  he  knows. 
It  would  seem  that  life  has  been  deliberately 
planned  to  teach  each  individual  by  the  rough 
handling,  the  jolts,  and  the  knocks,  which  follow 
even  innocent  disobedience  to  law;  for  the  strain 
of  life  and  its  temptations  lay  their  weight  early 


REBELLION  247 

upon  the  souls  of  youth.  The  beckonings  of 
pleasure,  the  love  of  ease,  the  solicitations  of  the 
interest  of  the  hour,  can  be  humoured  by  all  for 
the  time;  but  in  no  life  are  conditions  provided 
for  continuous  and  uninterrupted  enjoyment. 
The  fulfilment  of  all  wish  and  desire,  the  having 
all  that  we  want  when  we  happen  to  want  it,  are 
ordained  for  no  human  being.  Such  a  plan  for 
life,  though  backed  with  the  most  resolute  of  wills, 
the  most  astute  of  minds,  is  doomed  to  inevitable 
failure.  All  time  has  been  strewn  with  the  un- 
happy wrecks  of  those  who  set  out  determined  to 
alter  this  inalterable  law,  who  have  resisted  the 
inevitable  when  it  came,  and  resented  that  certain 
fate  decreed  by  the  "powers  that  be,"  and  who 
have  finally  succeeded  only  in  drinking  the  bitter 
dregs  of  the  cup  which  they  would  have  filled 
brimming  full  of  self-ordained  happiness. 

There  is  a  plan  of  life  which  the  simplest  may 
follow,  and  which,  followed  in  sincerity  and 
earnestness,  leads  on  to  inevitable  success.  Exist- 
ence has  provided  every  means  reason  could  ask 
for  perfecting  moral  living.  Temptations  them- 
selves, ever  at  hand,  but  afford  opportunities  for 
higher  thinking.  Every  hour  has  its  call  for  some 
act  unthought  till  inspired  by  the  higher  self ;  and 
good  deeds  and  higher  thoughts  stand  always  for 
well- willing.  In  life's  very  obstacles,  in  the  very 
strife  of  its  conflicts,  the  weight  of  its  burdens 
and  the  darkness  of  its  saddest  hours,  appear 
forces  which,  when  utilised  by  character,  add 
strength  to  strength.  Out  of  the  hard,  the  heavy, 
the  dark  and  the  sad,  character  may  emerge,  per- 


248       THE  MASTERY  OP  NERVOUSNESS 

f  ected  and  victorious.  The  body,  adaptable  as  it 
is,  cannot  accomplish  this.  Superb  as  are  the 
powers  of  intellect,  they  crumble  and  fall  in  the 
face  of  such  attacks.  But  there  is  a  mass  of 
power  behind  body  and  intellect  which  can  make 
man  the  invincible  fighter,  incapable  of  surrender 
to  the  forces  about  him,  superior  to  any  possibility 
of  disloyalty  to  the  best  or  rebellion  to  the  Master 
Force.  This  power  is  commonly  neglected  by 
most,  and  so  rarely  used  by  many,  that  unfortu- 
nates pass  this  way  and  never  know  its  saving 
thrill,  never  feel  that  impulse  welling  within  which 
gives  to  its  possessor  a  strength  over  life's  dis- 
couragements which  he  may  well  call  divine. 

The  Problem  of  Self-Assertion. — But  weak  and 
defective  and  failing  as  he  may  be  in  his  moral 
adjustments,  man  is  a  fighting  animal.  He  has 
fought  the  beasts  of  plain  and  jungle  well-nigh 
to  their  extinction.  He  has  carried  the  torch  of 
his  learning  into  the  world's  darkest  recesses, 
and  has  wrapped  the  globe  with  his  cables  bearing 
lightning-sped  information  to  all  its  parts.  He 
has  fought  his  way  from  primitive  weakness  to 
a  control  of  the  elemental  forces,  which  has  long 
since  made  him  physically  the  master  of  living 
things.  And  to-day  he  is  a  powerful  engine  with 
a  will  which  brooks  little  interference  with  his 
purposes.  Modern  man  is  in  position  to  exercise 
a  large  degree  of  self-assertion.  He  is  a  master 
of  many  things.  He  is  the  director  of  many 
forces.  He  has  so  successfully  wrung  from  Na- 
ture her  secrets  that  his  material  "cup  runneth 
over."  His  wealth  accumulates  until  an  island 


REBELLION  249 

nation  can  spend  $500,000,000  a  year  for 
luxuries,  and  a  small  continent  can  utterly  waste 
$100,000,000  a  day  in  slaughtering  its  choicest 
sons,  and  keep  up  this  expenditure,  not  months, 
but  years.  Man  has  long  since  so  improved  his 
prowess,  his  ability  to  cope  with  the  mighty  forces 
of  existence,  that  it  is  to-day,  for  nations  and  for 
individuals,  not  so  much  a  question  of  self-asser- 
tion as  of  self-repression. 

By  obeying  the  promptings  of  the  voices  of 
desire  and  ambition,  man  has  multiplied  his 
wealth  and  beautified  his  domain.  But  there  is 
an  obedience  which  is  slavery.  There  are  voices 
within  which  guide  man,  not  to  victory,  but  to 
defeat.  He  must  early  learn  that  his  passions, 
magnificent  forces  as  they  are,  capable  as  they 
will  always  be  of  adding  zest  and  beauty  to  life, 
will  never  be  forces  which  should  be  recognised 
as  leaders.  But  human  nature  feels  no  influences 
more  keenly,  and  is  too  ready  to  accept  passions' 
counsel  and  to  rebel  at  any  control  which  would 
question  their  authority.  The  problem  of  self- 
assertion  will  always  be  one  of  choice  of  the  power 
which  shall  be  utilised  in  the  furtherance  of  life 
and  of  the  methods  by  which  this  force  shall  be 
used.  The  balance  between  self-assertion  and 
self -repression  is  one  which  must  ever  change  as 
the  battle  ebbs  and  flows.  During  the  hours  of 
strife,  for  the  attack,  emphatically  when  the  tide 
is  turning  against  the  forces,  and  in  the  dark  days 
following  defeat,  assertion  must  ever  stand  out 
and  all  the  forces  worthy  of  use  must  be  enlisted. 
But  in  the  days  of  victory,  when  the  enemy  has 


250        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

been  overcome  and  the  spoils  of  war  are  in  our 
hands,  then  must  restraint  ever  pluck  the  sleeve 
of  self  and  hold  it  in  check. 

Our  world  is  truly  a  complex  manifestation  of 
force.  We  have  our  beginning  in  its  miraculous 
expression,  through  which  new  life  springs  into 
being.  It  is  force  which  keeps  us  all  along  the 
way,  and  force  in  another  form  finally  ends  our 
existence.  Force  is  essential  to  life;  the  force 
which  drives,  held  in  check  at  the  right  time  by 
the  force  which  restrains,  will  ever  be  the  basis 
of  progress.  Puny  man  has  confronted  the  tre- 
mendous possibilities  of  existence,  not  with  the 
power  which  he  has  generated  within  his  weak 
self,  but  by  yoking  his  mind  with  the  forces  of 
Nature,  and  working  and  living  in  harmony  with 
powers  which  would  otherwise  destroy.  That 
throbbing,  irresistible  mass  of  metal,  which  fairly 
spurns  its  steel  roadway  as  it  speeds  from  city 
to  city,  the  steam  locomotive,  represents  Nature's 
powers  in  action,  directed  and  controlled  by  man 's 
hand.  In  the  electric  dynamo,  man  yokes  his 
mind  with  the  stored  sun-power  of  ages  gone,  as 
he  thoughtlessly  feeds  his  boilers;  or  uses  that 
same  sun-force  after  it  has  lifted  and  carried  the 
ocean's  strength  to  the  mountain-tops.  The  hu- 
man idea  harnesses  Niagara,  and  turns  a  wild, 
heartless,  relentless  rush  of  power  into  a  humble 
factory-hand.  Mental  force  is  a  higher  expression 
of  power  than  physical  force.  But  man  himself 
creates  neither.  He  is  but  a  wonder-machine 
which  utilises  force — force  which  comes  to  him 
through  food  and  drink,  which  passes  into  his 


REBELLION  251 

mind  from  the  volumes  of  history,  from  the  tomes 
of  science,  from  the  book  of  the  law,  there  to 
accumulate,  and  to  be  expressed  by  him  in  word 
or  act,  wisely  or  ill.  Man  may  develop  self  into 
a  dynamo  which  can  transmute  the  elemental 
forces  into  tireless  servants,  unthinking,  unpro- 
testing,  unresting;  which  can  transform  thought 
into  the  actions  that  erect  dynasties  and  destroy 
monarchies;  which  may  vitalise  frailty  of  body, 
the  simple,  guileless  mind,  the  untutored,  unde- 
signing  heart,  into  forces  which  will  lead,  and 
sway,  and  inspire,  and  save  thousands  yet  unborn. 
As  surely  as  mind  is  becoming  the  master  of 
matter,  so  ultimately  will  character  become  the 
ruler  of  reason. 

Rebellion. — Mankind  in  general  is,  however, 
still  far  removed  from  that  state  of  approximate 
perfection  in  which  mind  and  body  are  the  willing 
servants  of  the  moral  self.  Character  as  a  mas- 
tering force  has  come  to  her  own  only  in  the 
exceptional  individual.  With  many  that  "wild 
beast  of  self  "  is  still  the  power  which  periodically, 
if  not  consistently,  controls.  That  untrained 
self — the  undeveloped  self,  the  self-seeking  self, 
that  self  so  greedy  for  gold,  for  position,  for  ease, 
for  power — is  still  the  unconquered  master  of  the 
individual.  Self-assertion  perverted  is  a  domin- 
ating force  which  rebelliously  resists  the  correct- 
ing hand  of  Nature,  which  resents  the  direction 
of  higher  reason  to  follow  any  but  the  path  of 
least  resistance ;  which  revolts  in  the  face  of,  and 
spurns  the  counsel  of  idealistic  morality.  The 
self  that  lives  for  self  rejects  the  guidance  of 


252        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

law  and  order,  scorns  the  counsel  of  righteous- 
ness, or  right-wayness,  and  uses  its  marvellous 
capacity  to  ends  which  can  be  but  destructive,  as 
all  misguided  force  must  ultimately  become.  An 
inevitable  servitude,  inevitable  failure  and  despair 
must  be  the  end  of  such  rebellion.  The  mob  can 
never  remain  master.  Mob  forces  are  ever  de- 
structive forces,  and  sooner  or  later  that  very 
lawless  mass  will  beg  for  a  master  who  will  or- 
ganise and  guide  them,  or  they  starve.  That  very 
force  which,  restrained  and  guided,  will  produce 
the  choicest  of  characters — lives  fairly  inspiring 
in  their  potent  usefulness — when  misselected  or 
misdirected  rends  human  peace  asunder.  The 
hundred-ton  passenger  locomotive,  eager,  panting 
to  carry  man's  cares,  to  augment  his  pleasures, 
to  minify  his  labours,  becomes  a  relentless  demon 
of  death  and  destruction  when  not  controlled  by 
its  master's  hand.  The  dynamo  which  lends  its 
labour-saving  force  to  all  manner  of  machines, 
which  speeds  the  velvet  wheels  of  pleasure,  and 
which  diffuses  a  gentle  glow  to  library,  nursery 
and  sick  room,  can  send  forked,  death-dealing 
lightning  to  ruthlessly  burn,  wreck  and  destroy 
property  and  life,  if  it  escapes  the  wise  hand  of 
restraint.  Even  so  it  is  with  those  forces  which 
pass  into  man  from  his  surroundings  and  are 
expressed  by  him  through  muscle,  mind  and 
spirit. 

We  begin  our  rebellion  young.  The  child  re- 
sents the  perversity  of  things  with  an  intensity 
equalling  that  of  his  more  expressive  elders.  The 
foolish,  weakening  habit  of  reviling  obstructions 


REBELLION  253 

to  our  progress,  interruptions  to  our  pleasure, 
annoyances  in  our  work,  occasioned  by  the  resist- 
ance of  inanimate  objects,  is  an  early  element  of 
imperfect  adjustment  producing  a  common  nerv- 
ous leakage.  There  are  those  who  have  an  end- 
less chain  of  curses  for  the  motor  which  has  "gone 
dead,"  for  the  plough  which  loses  its  point  on  a 
hidden  rock,  for  the  roof  that  leaks,  for  the  plumb- 
ing that  freezes,  for  the  storm  that  does  not  fit 
their  convenience.  Many  a  piece  of  work  partly 
finished  is  torn  in  shreds  when  an  innocent  needle 
breaks  in  the  machine.  The  dish  passively  over- 
heated is  doomed  to  destruction  if  it  unconsciously 
burns  certain  hands.  The  habit  of  fussing  at 
things  which  are  harmless  and  useful  additions  to 
pleasure  and  comfort  is  one  of  the  senseless  forms 
of  rebellion,  displaying  lack  of  reason  and  de- 
ficiency in  restraint — a  misdirection  of  energy 
productive  only  of  waste. 

But  the  damage  of  such  expressions  of  imma- 
turity is  insignificant  when  compared  to  that 
ceaseless,  sullen  murmur  of  resentment  which 
wells  up  from  the  lives  of  the  many  who  feel 
themselves  victims  of  the  "eternal  grind "  of 
toil.  And  grind  it  is,  and  has  been  since  so-called 
enlightenment  has  multiplied  the  world's  work 
until  its  requirements  are  insatiable  and  its  de- 
mands never  met ;  from  the  days  when  the  captives 
were  forced  to  make  "bricks  without  straw" 
through  the  untellable  slaveries  of  the  ages,  even 
to  the  present  day  with  its  wailing  "Song  of  the 
Shirt:" 


254        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

"With  its  stitch,  stitch,  stitch, 

In  poverty,  hunger  and  dirt ; 
Sewing  at  once  with  a  double  thread 
A  shroud  as  well  as  a  shirt. ' ' 

No  wonder  murnrnrings  have  grown  into  curs- 
ings, and  poverty,  driven  to  desperation — rebel- 
lious— has  stolen,  and  murdered  and  prostituted 
self,  in  the  helpless,  hopeless  struggle.  But 
thanks  to  the  very  selfishness  of  industry,  steam 
and  electricity  have  become  cheaper  at  last  than 
human  flesh  and  blood,  and  the  grind  is  no  longer 
the  hapless  slavery  of  the  past. 

By  the  many  the  joy  of  work  has  never  been 
learned.  Servants  resent  their  servitude,  but  not 
with  that  constructive  resentment  which  leads 
them  to  do  all  well,  and  then  do  that  little  com- 
plemental  more  which  stands  for  unusual  service, 
and  having  thus  done,  to  spend  some  leisure,  pos- 
sibly a  sleep  hour,  in  gaining  the  additional  knowl- 
edge which  is  the  price  of  all  real  superiority. 
The  mother  rebels  at  the  time  she  must  give  her 
home  and  children,  envying  the  neighbour  who 
is  risking  her  children's  future  soul-welfare  in 
the  hands  of  an  eye-serving  nursery  maid.  The 
son  of  wealth  rebels  at  what  he  calls  the  "grind" 
of  study,  and  jeopardises  his  future  self-esteem 
by  frittering  away  his  college  hours  in  self-in- 
dulgent license.  Bankers  resent  the  responsibili- 
ties of  their  honourable  positions ;  lawyers  and 
doctors  and  even  ministers  work  in  an  atmosphere 
of  protest,  perverting  life's  potential  joy,  their 
one  opportunity  for  winning  sustained  happiness, 
as  they  fail  to  adjust  themselves  harmoniously 


KEBELLION  255 

to  the  work  of  hand  and  mind,  whatever  it  is, 
that  knocks  at  the  door  of  their  strength  to-day. 
For  most  workers  the  so-called  "  eternal  grind " 
is  but  a  self -pitying  sentiment,  hauled  into  lives 
which  should  be  wholesomely  content.  Those  who 
curse  industry  to-day  are  far  more  often  rebels 
to  progress,  disrupters  of  their  own  peace, 
breeders  of  the  disease  of  discontent,  than  the 
helpless  victims  of  the  "iron  heel  of  greed. " 

The  Indian  possessed  for  many  centuries  a  land 
fairly  teeming  with  force-producing  wealth.  The 
great  lakes  of  crude  petroleum  and  the  thousands 
of  square  miles  of  dynamic  and  comfort-promis- 
ing coal  were  useless  to  him,  for  his  mind  had  no 
conception  of  their  value.  Most  of  us  pass 
through  life  to-day,  poor,  miserable,  wretched, 
starving  and  freezing,  even  as  did  the  ignorant 
Bed  Man  of  old,  with  wealth  at  our  very  door. 
We  call  it  misfortune.  We  are  yet  too  ignorant 
to  reach  out  and  take  these  hard,  black  experi- 
ences and  kindle  them  into  strength  and  warmth, 
into  power  and  gladness,  but  let  our  souls  starve 
in  the  midst  of  unrecognised  plenty.  When  mis- 
fortunes come,  we  rebel  in  hot  anger  and  become 
perfect  psychic  desperadoes ;  or  we  grow  into  the 
habit  of  condemnation  because  of  losses  in  busi- 
ness, failure  of  crops,  or  miscarriage  of  plans, 
looking  for  faults  in  all  that  occurs,  making  our- 
selves and  others  miserable,  forever  on  edge,  and 
finally  degenerating  into  chronic  kickers. 

Eebellion  in  our  relations  to  others  may  be  ex- 
pressed in  the  habit  of  cultivating  dissatisfaction ; 
in  giving  way  to  expressions  of  acute  grouch 


256        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

which  ever  tends  to  become  chronic.  Kebellion  in 
other  hearts  finds  its  expression  in  a  malice  which 
is  harboured  through  the  years,  a  malice  which 
quickly  puts  strife  into  their  relations  with  asso- 
ciates, and  robs  them  and  others  of  that  inspiring 
wholesomeness  of  contact  which  is  the  normal  re- 
lationship of  all  helpful-hearted  coworkers.  Be- 
bellion  smouldering  through  the  years  may  turn 
one  from  all  honest  review  of  his  own  faults, 
causing  him  to  look  outside  of  self  for  some  one 
upon  whom  to  lay  the  blame  for  trouble  which 
is  of  his  own  making.  This  all  tends  to  develop 
despair,  and  despair  accepts  that  wretched  atti- 
tude toward  all  of  life's  relations  which  stands 
for  the  bitterness  of  failure.  He  has  thought  but 
superficially  who  does  not  early  recognise  that 
failure  is  a  universal  experience;  that  all  who 
plan,  that  all  who  strive,  are  certain  to  meet  ob- 
stacles which  they  cannot  surmount,  combinations 
of  circumstances  which  they  could  not  foresee; 
that  all  at  some  time  must  be  the  objects  of  mis- 
conception and  misjudgment.  Failure  is  one  of 
life 's  sternest  lessons,  but  a  lesson  which,  learned, 
mellows  and  enriches  and  strengthens  for  the  fight 
along  higher  lines;  for  failure  is  not  the  final 
word  to  any  but  the  weakling  and  the  coward. 

Of  all  forms  of  imperfect  adjustments  as  ex- 
pressed in  rebellion  to  our  surroundings,  that 
which  makes  possible  the  home  of  strife  is  the 
most  sad  and  the  most  destructive  to  those  in- 
spiring, tender  leadings  which  should  so  hearten 
our  work-a-day  lives.  It  is  a  rebellion  to  the 
very  sacredness  of  living  which  allows  home 


REBELLION  257 

strife.  Sulkiness,  impatience,  and  irritability — 
the  undue  susceptibility  to  anger — are  rebels 
which  invade  the  very  sanctity  of  human  relation- 
ships, when  they  pollute  that  home  atmosphere  in 
which  the  soul  should  find  its  tenderest  mercies, 
its  sweetest  solaces,  its  most  joyous  associations. 
What  a  sacrilegious  warfare  is  the  damning  home 
feud,  which  drives  so  many  to  find  pleasure  or 
forgetfulness  in  those  indulgences  which  can  only 
be  purchased  with  loss  to  manhood  and  woman- 
hood. Disagreements  must  be.  No  persons  of 
red  blood  and  minds  worthy  the  name  can  asso- 
ciate without  them,  but  disagreement  only  means 
discord  in  the  common,  the  weak  and  the  unworthy. 
Disagreements,  keen,  active,  aggressive,  should 
be  stimulating  and  wholesome  influences.  But 
more  frequently  are  they  occasions  in  which  the 
intensity  of  feeling  is  far  out  of  proportion  to 
the  whole  subject.  How  often,  instead  of  develop- 
ing that  wholesome  self-respect  which  grows  out 
of  earnest,  fair  competition  in  argument  or  dis- 
cussion, they  descend  into  the  vulgarity  of  per- 
sonalities, and  wrench  and  twist  and  hurt!  In 
how  many  homes  does  the  din  of  discord  fairly 
drive  its  members  into  a  frenzy  of  tension,  when 
home,  above  all  relations  of  man 's  making,  should 
stand  for  " strife  shut  out  and  .love  shut  in."  In 
all  life's  relations  contentions  will  come.  Many 
will  grow  out  of  ignorance,  and  many  more  will 
be  the  expressions  of  resentment  or  rebellion  in 
the  form  of  wilful  contention.  Men  of  culture 
rise  above  feeling  in  the  matter  of  disagreement, 
and  discuss  their  differences  academically.  It  is 


258        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

given  man  to  gently,  seriously,  kindly,  firmly  re- 
view all  legitimate  questions  of  human  relation- 
ship thoughtfully  and  constructively;  but  the 
tight  throats,  the  tense  muscles  and  tenser  feel- 
ings which  accompany  even  the  discussions  of  the 
cut  of  the  gown  or  the  seasoning  of  the  soup,  mark 
the  wretched  weakness  of  those  natures  who  have 
rebelled  against  peace-producing  restraint. 

If  we  are  to  win  the  battle  of  personal  mastery, 
we  must  lay  hold  on  a  force  higher  than  reason 
alone,  for  force  of  mind  not  governed  by  force  of 
spirit  does  not  make  man  good.  The  mind  may 
be  as  restless  as  the  storm-tossed  sea,  giving  way 
to  outbreaks  of  intensest  anger,  sulking  or  pouting 
for  days  with  a  childish  craving  to  be  petted  back 
into  sweetness,  chronically  irritable,  ever  dissat- 
isfied, resenting  and  contending.  Misdirected 
mental  force  may  be  wildly  devilish  in  its'  actions, 
and  in  such  an  atmosphere  nerves  of  steel  become 
unstrung.  And  the  poor  soul  pleads  for  the  peace 
which  is  not. 

This  capacity  for  rebellion,  so  strong,  with  such 
a  large  variety  of  manifestations,  was  not  given 
man  to  encompass  his  defeat;  but,  misdirected, 
becomes  a  force  which,  without  idealistic  moral 
guidance,  he  will  ever  use  to  his  destruction.  But 
when  he  finally  directs  his  power  of  rebellion 
against  that  self  which  hates  and  fears  and  sur- 
renders, he  will  create  that  new  order  of  being — 
the  superman. 


CHAPTEE  XIX 
SURRENDER 

Life's  Inevitable  Disasters. — Loss  begins  in 
childhood.  The  babe  is  king  of  us  all.  The  grim 
visage  of  the  warrior  softens  in  the  presence  of 
its  cooing  innocence ;  nobility  stops  and  turns  and 
does  homage;  rich  and  poor,  high  and  low,  young 
and  old,  kneel  at  the  cradle  to  welcome  the  bright, 
new,  young  soul.  But  it  cannot  last.  Even  with 
the  realisation  of  its  imperialistic  power,  the 
sceptre  is  snatched  away,  and  life 's  first  inevitable 
loss  is  vaguely  felt.  Later,  impetuous,  hot- 
hearted  youth  looks,  and  longs,  and  loves,  and 
demands,  and  is  refused ;  and  the  light  of  life  goes 
out  for  the  time,  and  misery  and  anguish  tear  the 
throbbing  heart,  and  bitter  despair  seems  to  in- 
vade the  soul.  Mother's  teaching  has  painted 
"  goodness "  across  the  brow  of  all,  but  contact 
soon  reveals  that  goodness  is  often  but  a  mask, 
and  that  some  do  not  even  pretend  to  live  under 
this  epithet ;  and  that  tragic  disaster  of  the  young 
life,  the  loss  of  trust  in  a  human  being,  the  threat- 
ened loss  of  trust  in  human  nature,  come  to  shake 
the  foundations  of  faith.  It  is  as  inevitable  as 
life  itself  that  youth  cannot  wax  into  maturity 
without  losing  one  after  another  of  those  won- 
derful ideals  which  made  his  world  so  glorious. 

259 


260        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

But  only  the  weak  lose  heart,  for  is  there  not  a 
universe  of  superb  wealth  and  fascinating  things, 
which  promises  our  manifold  abilities  insatiable, 
unending  satisfaction?  And  so,  resolutely  and 
intensely,  maturity  lays  hold  on  the  things  of  the 
world,  to  know,  to  possess,  to  use  them,  with  a 
vision  of  undying  joy.  But  how  soon,  in  spite  of 
our  protests  with  self,  the  disillusioning  realisation 
creeps  in  that  the  power  of  things  to  please  is 
limited;  that  with  the  addition  of  possessions 
comes  a  subtraction  of  appreciation.  On  the  heels 
of  this  come  other  losses,  as  we  learn  how  rapidly 
our  gold  loses  its  power  to  buy;  how  even  that 
which  we  once  called  beauty,  of  form,  or  tone,  or 
colour,  is  failing  in  its  charm.  Even  that  ma- 
turity, which  we  are  prone  to  call  successful, 
seems  fated  to  drift  toward  increasing  emptiness, 
through  a  growing  realisation  of  the  inability  of 
those  things  which  we  handle,  and  taste,  and  see, 
to  bring  the  depths  of  satisfaction  which  stands 
for  happiness.  These  are  some  of  the  inevitable 
losses  of  the  developing  soul,  losses  which  some 
claim  simply  show  the  atrophy  of  the  human 
powers  for  enjoyment;  losses  which  others  affirm, 
declaring  that  their  affirmation  is  based  upon  ex- 
periences as  real  as  any  of  life,  are  but  a  clearing 
of  the  stage  for  something  higher,  better  and 
grander.  The  one  who  has  not  realised  that  life 
is  an  inevitable  losing  has  thought  but  lightly 
upon  the  realities  of  existence.  How  much  of 
this  loss  leaves  an  emptiness  unfilled,  how  much 
of  it  becomes  an  opportunity  for  greater  posses- 
sions, can  never  be  determined  by  people  or  things, 


SURRENDER  261 

by  riches  or  beauty,  but  will  ever  be  a  question 
of  the  inner  self. 

To  the  developed  mind,  to  the  living,  growing 
soul,  most  so-called  losses  are  but  apparent.  But 
most  of  us  find  ourselves  lacking  in  the  under- 
standing, the  philosophic  insight,  to  remain 
morally  stable  in  the  midst  of  so  much  to  confuse ; 
and  we  at  times  wonder  why  we  are  here.  Life 
is  so  heartless,  so  cruel,  so  disappointing,  and 
the  conditions  which  it  lays  upon  us  seem  so 
merciless.  Until  we  have  thought  our  best 
thoughts  deeply  and  truly,  until  we  have  felt  with 
the  charity  which  knows  no  bitterness,  until  we 
have  dedicated  our  wills  to  the  best  within  us  and 
opened  our  hearts  to  the  best  about  us,  calamity 
will  ever  grip  us  with  a  crushing  force.  "We  are 
quick,  in  the  face  of  trouble,  to  speak  of  the  limit 
of  our  powers  of  endurance,  and  for  many  that 
limit  is  quickly  reached.  Bare  powers  of  endur- 
ance are  possessed  by  the  few.  For  others,  sur- 
render to  the  secretly  coveted  license  possible  in 
rebellion,  or  despairing  surrender  of  effort,  resist- 
ance, or  even  intention,  is  a  defective  reaction 
which  honeycombs  foundations,  and  constitutes 
the  defect  in  many  nervous  lives. 

In  these  days  when  money  buys  so  much  and 
there  is  so  much  money  to  spend,  gold  has  blinded 
the  eyes  of  the  many  to  the  mission  of  suffering. 
Thinking  to  purchase  immunity  from  the  ills  of 
life  in  some  miraculous  way,  many  parents  fail 
utterly,  even  as  perchance  their  elders  failed,  to 
translate  the  messages  of  suffering  to  their  chil- 
dren, not  as  a  fear-breeding  power,  an  impending 


262        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

threat,  but  as  a  wholesome,  vitalising,  stimulat- 
ing, preparatory  truth.  Life  is  made  up  of  losses, 
which,  to  him  who  is  prepared,  may  become  gains. 
Life  will  bring  to  all  as  they  live  its  span,  calamity, 
suffering  in  some  form,  and  within  the  individ- 
ual's own  soul  rests  the  possibility  of  these 
inevitable  visitations  to  dishearten,  to  rob,  to 
paralyse  and  to  putrefy ;  or  to  stimulate,  to  enrich, 
to  vitalise,  to  purify. 

Recklessness. — Brute  force,  intellectual  superi- 
ority, independence  so-called,  the  liberty  of  selfish 
willing,  all  appeal  to  the  undeveloped  nature  as 
expressions  of  self,  indicating  strength  of  individ- 
uality. The  developed  life  is  not  so  much  a  matter 
of  years  as  of  right  living.  When  the  "No"  of 
circumstances  comes  to  interrupt  plans,  when 
Fate  drops  the  bar  behind  the  door  of  beckoning 
Opportunity,  when  Disaster  ruthlessly  crushes 
and  destroys  the  products  of  our  handiwork,  or 
brings  to  naught  the  creations  of  our  fancy ;  when 
Death  snatches  away  that  which  stood  for  what 
we  called  our  immortality — the  one  who  was  to 
take  up  the  thread  of  progress  where  we  dropped 
it — the  aggressive  nature  rebels.  It  may  be  an 
intense,  destructive  explosion  of  force,  of  grief 
and  hate,  wrecking  in  a  few  hours  or  weeks  that 
which  can  never  be  replaced ;  or  deep-lying  sullen, 
unforgiving  recklessness  may  pervert  the  ardour 
of  life  into  calculating  resentment,  and  slowly 
lock  all  the  well-springs  of  goodness,  even  as  the 
midwinter  cold  congeals  the  sap  of  tree  and 
flower. 

A  touch  of  recklessness  is  good  for  all  of  us. 


SURRENDER  263 

Occasions  exist  where  the  best  of  our  knowledge 
fails  >and  where  overeaution  would  result  in  useless 
inertia — then  a  dash  of  recklessness,  the  willing- 
ness to  take  the  chance  until  the  reality  of  the 
situation  is  revealed,  is  a  saving  grace  for  the 
timid  and  fearsome.  The  highest  form  of  cour- 
age which  man  has  yet  developed,  that  courage 
which  makes  impossible  any  expressions  of  selfish, 
heartless,  destructive  heedlessness — moral  cour- 
age, man's  highest  deciding  force — not  infre- 
quently finds  the  only  right  road  the  one  which 
hesitating  caution  would  label  as  reckless.  But 
most  reckless  expressions  are  not  those  which 
have  a  speaking  acquaintance  with  so  high  a 
quality  as  moral  courage.  When  we  give  up  to 
these  impulses,  we  are  usually  surrendering  our- 
selves into  the  clutch  of  the  commonplace;  we 
are  usually  but  dashing  down  the  incline  of  least 
resistance. 

In  a  little  Southern  town,  for  a  number  of  years 
a  modest  front  yard  has  been  a  veritable  garden 
of  beauty.  An  impetuous  soul  is  the  housewife 
there — a  finely-wrought,  high-strung  woman,  with 
a  nervous  heredity  doubly  neurotic.  Nervous  in- 
validism  was  apparently  foreordained,  and  per- 
force partially  accepted.  But  spirit  was  there, 
and  rebellion  to  fate  and  things  and  people — that 
burning  hot  kind,  possible  to  those  who  have  both 
nerves  and  auburn  hair.  But  rebellions  did  not 
cure;  they  led  on  from  bad  to  worse.  Finally  a 
wise  surrender  was  made;  surrender  to  counsel 
which  adjusted  diet,  which  ordered  strength- 
generating  work  of  muscle,  which  made  clear  the 


264        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

limitations  of  heredity,  rectified  defects  of  teach- 
ing, and  revealed  the  exhausting  uselessness  of 
recklessly  directed  efforts  to  follow  the  dictates  of 
assumed  duties.  The  yard  space  was  limited  in 
that  home.  The  realisation  of  the  necessity  for 
active,  daily,  physical  effort  came  clearly.  Im- 
pulsiveness, impetuosity,  aggressiveness,  did  not 
disappear,  but  found  new  expression.  When 
these  qualities  came  to  the  surface,  they  were 
given  ample  and  full  expression  through  decisive, 
emphatic  punctuations,  not  in  speech,  but  in 
vicious  jabs  into  the  soil  with  hoe  and  spade. 
And  her  " jim-jams,"  as  she  called  them,  were 
worked  off  in  the  garden;  and  for  months  each 
year  beauty,  rich,  fragrant,  rare,  and  in  profu- 
sion, tells  its  sweet  tale  of  wisely  directed  reck- 
lessness. 

Through  our  study  of  work,  we  recognise  how 
exceptional  is  a  wholesome  attitude  toward  life's 
productive  duties.  Smouldering  rebellion  at  these 
very  fundamentals  of  happiness  exists  in  the 
hearts  of  many  workers.  Expressed  through  the 
recklessness  of  selfish  ends,  through  the  dis- 
honesty of  defective  effort,  the  carelessness  of  in- 
dolence, or  the  resentful  bitterness  of  envy,  many 
of  the  employed  drag  out  a  dogged  existence, 
slavishly,  not  masterfully,  rebelliously,  not  vic- 
toriously. Eesenting  the  whole  industrial  scheme 
of  life,  adding  no  drop  of  wholesomeness,  they 
inject  naught  but  venom  into  that  so  commonly 
strained  relationship  between  employer  and  em- 
ployee. Their  rebellion  seeks  the  adjustment  of 
life's  affairs  to  their  personal  wills;  insists  on 


SURRENDER  265 

that  impossible  license  of  reckless  individuality 
which  makes  of  life,  not  a  thing  of  law  and  order, 
but  a  chance  medley,  a  hodge-podge  of  personal 
whims  and  desires  and  opinions  and  ideas,  rob- 
bing it  of  that  stability  of  form  essential  to 
stability  of  purpose. 

Beckless  disregard  of  one's  righteous  concep- 
tion of  duty,  a  conception  unwarped  by  self-de- 
ception, is  one  of  life 's  most  exhausting  forms  of 
surrender.  It  so  rapidly  discounts  the  good, 
fades  the  freshness,  dulls  the  interest,  and  em- 
bitters the  sweetness  of  existence,  that  the  joy 
of  living  may  be  exhausted  at  thirty.  And  what 
a  surrender  this  is !  How  little  one  who  so  lives 
gets  of  the  possible  richness  of  life,  while  those 
who  cooperate  with  the  laws  of  well-doing  and 
well-thinking  seem  ever  to  be  renewing  their 
youth;  and  instead  of  nervous  exhaustion  laying 
its  palsying  hand  upon  the  interests  of  existence, 
even  as  youth  blossoms  into  the  fulness  of 
maturity,  strength  is  added  to  strength — and  many 
who  have  so  lived  are  young  at  seventy,  content, 
confident,  hopeful  and  strong.  They  have  allowed 
the  forces  of  good  the  right  of  way  through  their 
souls,  and  have  not  been  prematurely  exhausted 
through  a  useless  and  embittering  resistance  to 
those  forces  which  challenge  us  all,  through  ap- 
parent defeat  and  change,  and  loss  and  pain,  to 
develop  that  character  which  is  more  than  ideals, 
which  is  deeper  and  higher  and  broader  than 
things. 

Despair. — The  surrender  of  reason  or  restraint 
to  the  dominating  self  expressed  in  reckless  re- 


266        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

bellion,  can  but  belittle  the  better  living  essential 
to  the  sensitive  nature  of  the  nervous.  Even  so, 
it  is  not  comparable  in  its  hurt  of  all  that  goes 
to  make  self-mastery,  to  the  surrender  of  despair. 
The  aggressive  nature  becomes  reckless,  and 
thinks  or  acts  recklessly,  while  the  weaker  nature 
buries  its  initiative  in  the  mire  of  despair.  And 
for  many,  despair  is  so  easy,  apparently  an  in- 
stinctive reaction  to  the  oppressions  of  circum- 
stance. Many  have  never  risen  to  the  level  of 
healthy  views,  have  never  looked  out  upon  exist- 
ence from  a  comprehensive  vantage-point.  Life 
has  been  but  a  multiplication  of  painful  or  pleas- 
urable details,  lacking  in  coherency  or  governing 
principles,  depending  upon  those  commonplace 
forces  which  are  all  that  such  weak  natures  seem 
able  to  attract  to  their  assistance,  and  as  a  result, 
when  compared  to  their  possibilities,  they  live  at 
half -power,  never  having  attained  full  man-power. 
Comfortably  housed  and  carefully  groomed,  they 
grumble  at  existence,  and  in  the  midst  of  infinite 
plenties— not  those  which  can  be  purchased  by 
greenbacks  or  checks,  but  the  plenty  which  ever 
waits  to  attach  itself  to  the  right-willing  soul — 
they  cultivate  dissatisfaction  until  it  has  become 
the  infirmity  of  discontent.  For  such  small  souls 
defeat  in  life  is  foreordained.  Others  wear  them- 
selves nervously  threadbare  through  their  con- 
stant craving  for  the  unpossessed;  envious  of 
superiority,  wishing — not  willing  and  acting — 
they  too  invite  inevitable  defeat,  with  its  certain 
anguish  of  spirit.  Complexes  result,  having  the 
possibilities  of  unending  development.  Envy  and 


SURRENDER  267 

jealousy  can  never  be  sated  when  once  they  pos- 
sess the  mind,  and  the  sufferings  which  are  thus 
entailed  may  not  be  recounted — inner  illnesses 
which  bring  no  compensation,  self-ordained  suffer- 
ings barren  of  possible  good. 

Illness  is  pleaded  as  an  excuse  for  insufficient 
living  by  the  many  who  fail  to  find  in  the  limita- 
tions of  the  physical  their  opportunity  for  the 
refinement  of  the  mental,  for  the  exaltation  of 
the  moral.  There  are  illnesses  commonly  asso- 
ciated with  nervous  suffering,  which  the  chemist 
with  his  laboratories  and  the  physician  with  his 
accurate  methods  of  physical  diagnosis  can  never 
discern.  Often  the  neurotic's  ill-feeling  is  due  to 
an  illness  of  his  subconscious  mind.  Multiplied 
rebellious,  unworthy,  self-pitying  feelings,  which 
have  been  allowed  their  minute  in  consciousness, 
then  have  sunk  back  into  the  unconscious,  have 
each  added  a  touch  of  influence  to  the  sum  of  self 
experience;  and  in  time,  the  effect  on  the  sub- 
conscious, thought  life  of  these  depressing,  devi- 
talising toxins,  changes  normal  spontaneity  into 
sluggishness,  normal  rebound  into  inertia,  the  lilt 
of  innate  good  feeling  into  surliness  of  temper, 
and  the  thrilling  keenness  of  hope  into  dull,  dead- 
ening despair.  And  the  disease  of  self-pity  not 
only  finally  infects  its  victim's  conscious  expres- 
sion, but  extends  to  the  sources  of  feeling  appar- 
ently beyond  the  power  of  consciousness  to 
influence.  Thus  ultimately  may  be  produced  that 
sad,  yet  not  uncommon,  spectacle  of  the  human 
giant  of  limitless  possibilities — the  giant  of  in- 
domitable soul,  whose  will  could  have  resolved, 


268        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

and  attained  the  very  pinnacles  of  happiness  and 
content — bound,  miserably  helpless,  imprisoned 
by  the  multiplied  threads  of  self-pity. 

The  test  of  self  comes  when  through  incident, 
or  accident,  or  disaster,  we  find  ourselves  alone. 
It  may  be  for  the  hour,  for  the  day;  perchance 
something  big  and  good  and  noble  has  left  us, 
never  to  return,  and  the  loneliness  of  a  lifetime 
looms  before  us.  In  loneliness  we  find  what  we 
truly  are.  If  we  slink  about  in  dismal  despair, 
we  are  of  the  weaklings  indeed.  If  we  frantically 
rush  hither  and  thither  that  we  may  drown  our- 
selves in  the  intoxication  of  excitement,  or  resort 
to  ever  cowardly  surcease  of  memory  through 
drugs,  we  are  making  the  worst  of  loneliness ;  we 
are  robbing  self  of  the  very  possibility  of  living 
those  qualities  which  can  make  a  superlative  good 
out  of  being  alone.  That  dread  of  the  unenter- 
tained  self,  of  the  self  unstimulated  by  the  touch 
of  friendships  or  social  enjoyments,  may  resolve 
into  morbid  despair.  The  one  who  would  rise  su- 
perior to  harmful  expressions  of  his  nervous  sys- 
tem should  early  cultivate  the  art  of  being  alone, 
even  though  but  a  few  minutes  are  available  daily, 
a  habit  of  self-communion  should  be  established — 
communion  not  with  fears,  nor  ambition,  nor  re- 
sentments, nor  hatreds,  but  devoted  to  friendship 
with,  and  earnest  understanding  of  one's  own 
inner  life.  Many  a  person  brought  face  to  face 
with  his  soul,  would  not  recognise  it  as  his  own,  so 
poorly  is  he  acquainted  with  his  inner  self.  The 
fear  of  being  alone,  the  dread  of  loneliness,  even 
the  deep  despair  which  comes  when  we  are  the  vie- 


SURRENDER  269 

tims  of  utter  human  desertion,  all  fail  to  discredit 
any  of  the  essentials  of  character,  when  that  char- 
acter is  founded  upon  a  moral  self  with  which  we 
are  able  to  commune  without  shame. 

Many  moral  catastrophes  which  lead  on  to 
despair  become  imminent  when  the  nature  is  ex- 
hausted through  physical  or  mental  toxins.  It 
requires  strength  to  resist.  The  fight  cannot  be 
waged  with  any  success  when  we  are  working  with 
our  dregs.  Common  sense  should  prevent  any 
man  from  attempting  the  sterner  duties  of  his  life 
when  his  strength  is  depleted.  Truly  educated  is 
he  who  has  acquired,  and  wisely  and  assiduously 
maintains,  that  surplus  which  welcomes  fatigue 
but  does  not  know  that  exhaustion.  Eebellion, 
time  and  again,  leads  on  to  the  exhaustion  of 
despair,  of  despair  filled  with  gloomy  anticipa- 
tions, reeking  with  morbid  anxieties ;  and  morbid 
anxieties  are  ever  preparing  for  emotional  hurts ; 
and  usually  we  do  not  look  far  for  these  without 
finding  them. 

Illness  and  loneliness  and  failure  are  frequently 
reacted  to  with  a  bitterness  which  makes  exist- 
ence fairly  intolerable.  Despair  deepens  when 
we  find  so  many  of  our  tears — yes,  even  our 
prayers — apparently  ignored;  for  few  there  are, 
indeed,  who  in  their  extremity  do  not  impulsively 
turn  to  an  unseen  Higher  in  an  appeal  for  help. 
To  him  who  measures  his  blessings  in  terms  of 
worldly  success  or  by  the  presence  and  love  of 
friends  and  relatives,  there  is  the  bitterness  of 
defeat  in  the  refusal  of  an  apparently  heedless 
Heaven  to  answer  prayer  in  detail;  cosmic  in- 


270        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

difference  to  human  welfare  may  well  lead  on  to 
depths  of  reckless,  resentful  pessimism.  Such 
despair  is  akin  to  the  fatalistic  despair  reflected 
by  Sulpicius,  who,  when  Cicero  was  commisera- 
ting him  for  the  loss  of  his  child,  answered: 
"Why  should  I  mourn  my  daughter's  death,  when 
she  has  but  passed  down  the  throat  of  everlasting 
oblivion ?"  Fatalism  will  ever  stand  for  irre- 
ligion,  or  a  religion  of  decay.  The  living,  growing 
soul  feels  in  its  very  essence  a  certainty  which 
negates  such  acceptance  of  the  uselessness  of  its 
own  moral  will. 

There  is  a  soul-shrivelling  attitude  toward  life, 
haunting  many  a  poor  being  through  years  of 
nervous  wretchedness,  which  finds  in  terror  an 
ever-present  shadow,  chilling  and  darkening, 
mood-forming  and  despair-directing.  This  terror 
has  been  the  inspiration  for  ages  of  unworthy 
altars  for  the  worship,  not  of  a  Being  of  human 
intelligence,  not  of  a  Being  of  sympathetic  godly 
understanding,  but  of  a  relentless,  heartless 
Power  to  be  appeased.  Despair  when  shackled 
to  terror  can  produce  a  life  of  mental  and  moral 
wretchedness,  which  makes  any  hope  for  nervous 
restitution  vain,  unless  replaced  by  faith  in  a 
higher  "good"  which,  translated,  means  a  higher 
God. 

There  is  a  calamity  which  merits  despair,  a 
calamity  which  despair  was  created  to  serve — the 
calamity  of  spiritual  loss.  Loss  of  moral  self  is 
greater  than  loss  of  crops,  or  child,  or  reputation. 
Times  come  into  all  lives  when  optimism  falters, 
when  faith  weakens  and  seems  to  break,  and  when 


SURRENDER  271 

we  find  ourselves  submerged  under  a  smothering 
sea  of  trouble.  Sudden  failure  of  health,  over- 
powering, destructive  criticism,  the  thoughtless, 
heartless  ingratitude  of  children — these  and  ten 
thousand  other  disheartening  burdens  are  laid 
upon  humankind.  If  their  weight  destroy  any 
small  part  of  the  moral  self,  which  at  best  grows 
so  slowly,  then  indeed  does  despair  become  dis- 
aster. 

But  how  ignorantly  we  choose !  How  dense  we 
are  to  the  lessons  which  life  would  teach,  as  she 
lays  upon  us  the  inevitable  losses  and  sorrows  of 
existence!  When  we  are  thus  treated,  life  is  no 
longer  regarding  us  as  children,  no  longer  con- 
sidering us  as  simply  feeling,  thinking  creatures, 
but  is  appealing  to  the  man  within  who  can  smile 
at  the  hand  of  Time,  who  alone  can  see  in  the 
bitterness  of  defeat  an  incentive,  a  soul-strength- 
ening tonic,  and  who  only  can  translate  the  losses 
of  the  present  into  the  gains  of  the  future. 


CHAPTEE  XX 
DISCORD  WITH  SELF 

The  Burden  of  Self. — Man  may  be  profoundly 
unhappy.  Some  rarely  taste  serenity.  More 
know  a  few  hours  of  pleasure  or  isolated  moments 
of  joy,  only  to  quickly  slip  back  to  their  normal 
level  of  disturbed  feelings,  unsatisfied  cravings 
and  painful  restlessness.  Still  others  are  thrilled 
with  boundless  hopes,  never  to  be  fulfilled ;  ideals 
attract  and  impel  which  are  never  realised. 
Loves  kindle  and  burn,  not  unto  altar  fires,  but 
to  cold,  grey  ashes.  The  deep  questionings  within, 
the  struggles,  the  sufferings  which  make  up  man 's 
restless  life  are  ever  the  expressions  of  his  efforts 
for  internal — may  we  say,  eternal, — adjustment. 
The  burdens  with  which  he  cumbers  his  shoulders 
for  his  pilgrimage,  packed  heavy  with  the  world's 
goods,  are  his  least  load.  The  weight  which  he 
carries  in  his  own  heart,  the  pressing  weight 
which  he  lays  upon  his  own  mind,  the  relentless, 
dead  weights  which  he  chains  to  his  own  soul, 
constitute  the  true  burdens  of  his  existence. 
Some  of  these  no  earnest,  honest  soul  can  escape. 
They  are  inherent  to  a  developing  existence,  and 
unless  one  is  content  with  thoughtlessly,  reck- 
lessly, ignorantly  playing  at  living,  he  is  certain 
to  feel,  ever  and  anon,  the  tug  of  his  inner  bur- 
dens. 

272 


DISCORD  WITH  SELF  273 

A  rectifying  sense  of  unworthiness  comes  to 
stultify  the  aspiring  ego.  Failures  relentlessly 
bar  the  apparent  highway  to  success.  "The 
little  done,  the  undone  vast,"  would  palsy  Ambi- 
tion's hand.  The  sense  of  sin,  as  the  trail  of  the 
serpent,  would  ever  menace  the  joy  of  existence. 
The  spiritual  conflict,  with  its  multiplied  anoma- 
lies, utterly  confuses  many  a  wearied  wayfarer, 
until  all  seems  hopelessly  inconsistent  and  impos- 
sible. Infirmities  passed  down  through  heritage 
to  wither  the  innocent;  weaknesses  developing  in 
the  very  heat  and  struggle  of  the  battle  for  exist- 
ence; losses  of  property,  friends,  of  reputation, 
of  loved  ones,  of  hope  and  faith ;  the  ever-impend- 
ing mystery  of  death,  and  the  unbroken  silence 
shrouding  the  eternal  future,  are  elements  of  the 
ponderous  burden  which  weighs  down  human  life. 

As  we  study  the  lives  of  the  lower  animals,  we 
are  struck  by  their  comparatively  limited  capacity 
for  suffering,  the  simplicity  and  instinctive  ease 
with  which  they  make  their  adjustments  to  exist- 
ence, the  stoicism  with  which  they  face  physical 
pain,  their  lack  of  demonstration  and  passive  en- 
durance in  illness,  and  by  their  unpretentious 
deaths.  Their  worries  are  few,  and  their  "  con- 
scientious sufferings ' '  probably  no  more  than  fear 
manifestations,  or  the  sentimental  understanding 
of  their  human  friends. 

But  with  man  how  different !  His  capacity  for 
suffering  seems  infinite,  and  to  many  stands  for 
the  threatening,  chastening  vengeance  of  an 
aggrieved  and  angered  Maker.  But  the  truly 
thoughtful  cannot  escape  the  insistence  of  a 


274        THE  MASTEEY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

deeper  meaning  in  the  sufferings  of  the  human 
heart.  The  belief  that  the  mission  of  such  suffer- 
ing is  the  nurture  and  strengthening  of  the  moral 
nature,  lifts  it  from  the  domain  of  all  that  is  dreary 
and  hateful  and  hopeless  into  one  of  the  infinitely 
planned  forces  for  the  development  of  the  perfect 
man.  But  how  far  from  such  a  constructive  con- 
ception are  most  of  us !  Our  multiplied  burdens 
are  glibly  recited  as  reasons  for  failure,  as  ade- 
quate and  ample  causes  for  us  to  cultivate  dis- 
satisfaction with  life  and  its  methods.  And  it 
would  be  so  easy  to  cry,  "What  is  the  use?"  and 
recklessly  disregarding  the  inner  call,  respond 
gaily  to  the  beckoning  hand  of  pleasure  and  the 
eager  bid  of  profit,  letting  beauty  bewitch  and 
indulgence  intoxicate,  were  it  not  for  the  insistent 
quiet  voice  which  will  not  still,  were  it  not  for  the 
remorseless  black  hours  with  self  and  the  ghastly 
mornings  after.  Deep  thinking  is  not  necessary 
to  show  us  how  inevitably,  in  these  days  of  super- 
abundance, the  overgrowth  of  our  wants  brings 
on  a  wasting  of  our  capacity  for  enjoyment. 
Whenever  we  overreach  that  essential  balancing 
of  fairness  with  ourselves,  whenever  we  desert 
the  inner  better  for  the  outer  "good,"  we  realise 
some  sense  of  the  relentlessness  with  which  defeat 
attends  our  defective  attitudes. 

Life  faced  squarely,  and  its  challenge  accepted 
in  the  spirit  in  which  it  is  given,  is  a  serious  busi- 
ness, and  to  wring  from  it  that  victory  which 
stands  for  abiding  inner  calm,  for  peace  of  mind 
and  joy  of  soul,  calls  for  the  earnest  and  wise 
use  of  the  best  each  one  has.  There  is  a  strife 


DISCORD  WITH  SELF  275 

with  self,  with  rampant  thoughts,  with  errant 
feelings  and  apathetic  wills  which  is  essential 
to  all  true  developmental  progress,  and  no  wis- 
dom would  subtract  one  whit  from  the  sincerity, 
the  steadfastness  and  the  energy  with  which  the 
strife  for  high  moral  living  should  be  waged. 
But  wildly  as  thoughts  may  be  tangled,  and  dis- 
cordant as  may  be  the  din  of  jangled  emotions, 
they 'cannot  equal  in  damage  to  human  happiness 
and  productiveness  that  great  mass  of  non-essen- 
tial, self -centring  strife  with  self.  Thus  many  of 
us  choose  unwisely  and  persevere  persistently  in 
burdening  our  inner  life  with  that  which  but 
clutters  and  defaces  and  taints  and  eventually 
destroys  the  internal  serenity  so  essential  to  the 
strength  and  happiness  of  existence. 

The  Worry  Habit. — Even  as  our  hands  and 
eyes  examine  the  purchase  at  the  market-place, 
so  our  mind's  eye  should  scrutinise  its  own 
thoughts  and  plans,  its  feelings  and  its  decisions. 
The  seriousness  of  our  mental  activities  demands 
earnestness  of  censorship.  Anxiety  was  given  to 
make  us  doubly  alert  and  intense  to  meet  the  crises 
which  come,  but  worry  is  a  form  of  self -torment 
which  men  and  women  have  invented  these  latter 
busy  days.  In  this  worrying  world  the  worry- 
face  has  become  omnipresent.  The  knitted  brow, 
the  pursed,  tight  lips  early  rob  the  fairest  features 
of  their  fairness ;  intensity  of  tone  destroys  sweet- 
ness of  voice;  the  restless  hand  and  nervous  gait 
discredit  dignity  of  bearing ;  while  the  impatience 
and  the  whine,  the  selfish  intensity  and  waspish 
irritability  by  which  worry  is  so  frequently  ex- 


276        THE  MASTERY  OP  NERVOUSNESS 

pressed,  mar  life's  relationships,  and  but  em- 
bitter self  with  self. 

Worry  is  a  fear  expression — 'tis  anticipatory 
dread,  an  energy-leaking  habit,  easily  formed  and 
of  rapid  growth,  these  strenuous  times.  When 
once  entrenched  within,  it  casts  its  baneful  spell 
over  coming  events.  The  morning  starts  with 
an  inane  questioning  of  the  weather.  The  order- 
ing of  the  day's  food  supply,  the  return  of  the 
laundry,  the  children's  lessons  and  their  safe 
arrival  from  school,  the  matching  of  the  silk  for 
the  repair  of  the  old  dress,  become  matters  of 
more  than  state  importance;  while  the  crowded 
store,  the  damp  feet,  the  coughing  neighbour,  the 
wait  on  the  street  corner  for  the  car,  are  all 
seriously  and  anxiously  weighed  as  to  their  prob- 
able effect  upon  personal  health.  The  details  of 
office,  store  and  shop  are  allowed  to  burden  the 
mind,  to  weigh  down  and  depress  the  very  spirit 
which  should  be  the  well-spring  of  hourly  joy. 
The  clutch  of  worry  distorts  the  insignificant  into 
the  momentous,  the  non-essential  into  the  vital, 
the  inevitable  into  the  irreparable,  the  develop- 
mental into  the  excruciating.  Worry  so  saps  vital 
strength  that  it  is  small  wonder  that  the  worry 
habit  dominates  the  lives  of  most  of  the  nervously 
ill.  So  damaging  is  it  that,  if  unchecked,  it  is 
capable  of  snapping  the  cord  of  reason  in  those 
essentially  defective  through  nervous  heredity. 

Worry  so  often  masquerades  in  the  garb  of 
worthiness  that  many  become  its  innocent  victims. 
Maternal  solicitude,  with  all  its  love  and  tender- 
ness and  beauty,  is  its  favourite  lurking  place; 


DISCORD  WITH  SELF  277 

and  all  too  quickly  that  tender  passion,  under  this 
crude  touch,  degenerates  into  selfish,  unreasoning, 
useless  fear.  Necessity's  sombre  garments  are 
frequently  preempted  by  Worry's  craven  form- 
its  dignity  displaced  by  Worry's  mockery.  Duty, 
Honour,  Pride — all  surrender  their  virtues  to  this 
heartless  thief  of  good.  Worry  easily  persuades 
the  imagination  to  twist  coming  events  into  shapes 
of  terror,  until  we  cower  and  shudder  under  the 
shadow  of  the  very  phantoms  which  we  have 
created  within  our  breasts.  The  worry  habit  is 
capable  of  misdirecting  our  energies  until  half 
our  strength  is  wasted  upon  that  which  is  not 
alone  useless,  but  inwardly  damaging  and  disrupt- 
ing. Worry  is  a  teacher  of  fear,  a  counsellor  of 
indecision,  an  educator  of  misery.  As  with  things 
about  us,  so  inwardly  we  may  unwisely  choose 
and  hurtfully  attend  to  ten  thousand  gripping 
interests,  neglecting,  even  through  the  years,  the 
supreme  question  of  character  development. 
Worry  is  a  reaction  of  ignorance,  of  inadequacy 
of  will,  of  narrowness  of  conception.  The  full- 
grown  character,  human  nature  living  under  the 
inspiration  of  high  moral  ideals,  and  the  soul 
which  has  broken  away  from  selfishness,  imme- 
diate and  ultimate,  know  not  worry. 

The  Morbid  Conscience. — Worry  reaches  its 
climax  as  a  damaging  influence  when  it  succeeds 
in  interfering  with  the  wholesome,  constructive 
workings  of  conscience.  Conscience  is  the  heart 
of  the  moral  nature,  a  heart  whose  throbs  are 
quickened  in  the  presence  of  temptation,  which 
feels  anguish  in  moral  defeat  and  degradation,  a 


278        THE  MASTEEY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

heart  which  aches  like  a  mother's  for  the  good 
which  has  been  lost,  a  heart  which  cries  out  and 
will  not  be  stilled  when  the  vital  truths  of  one's 
highest  conception  of  living  have  been  violated. 
But  all  these  disturbances  of  this  delicate  organ 
of  the  soul  have  in  them  elements  of  rectification 
and  purification  which,  if  recognised  and  accepted 
and  followed,  lead  to  higher  niceties  of  moral  ad- 
justment. The  presence  of  a  conscience  ever 
stands  for  a  higher  order  of  being.  In  the  ab- 
sence of  its  guidance,  man's  struggle  toward  per- 
fection would  have  long  since  ended  in  universal 
riotous  living.  Cold  reason  would  eschew  it ;  ma- 
terialism would  claim  it  as  but  incidental ;  selfish 
ambition  ignores  it;  but  the  fact  remains  that 
when  men  are  honest  with  themselves,  when  they 
are  in  deadly  earnest  in  their  quest  for  the  best, 
they  do  not  go  far  astray  without  realising  that 
there  is  something  wrong  in  their  inner  life. 

Racial  instincts  are  planted  deep,  fundamentally 
and  creatively  deep,  in  human  nature,  but  when 
two  or  more  are  gathered  together,  these  instincts 
are  soon  found  at  variance  with  ethical  demands. 
The  whole  problem  of  self-adjustment  would  be 
infinitely  simplified  were  the  conscience  an  accurate 
guide,  were  the  conscience  incorruptible,  did  the 
conscience  present  a  unified  standard  for  all.  But 
conscience  is  only  the  medium  through  which  the 
saving  light  of  truth  enters  the  soul,  a  lens  all 
too  often  imperfect,  a  lens  which  may  distort  and 
bedim  and  pervert  the  truth.  Just  as  poorly  ad- 
justed spectacles  set  the  whole  landscape  awry, 
so  the  defective  conscience  defaces  truth,  and  it 


DISCORD  WITH  SELF  279 

is  well  for  the  nervous  sufferer  to  calmly  and 
seriously  investigate  the  quality  of  the  conscience 
he  is  using.  The  easy-going  kind  is  a  very  com- 
fortable possession,  when  one  is  satisfied  to  live 
and  die  identified  with  the  lower  orders  of  man- 
kind. Such  a  conscience  passively  smiles  as  its 
owner  blandly  allows  the  essence  of  his  character 
to  be  frittered  away  in  exchange  for  littleness 
and  barrenness.  The  selfish  conscience  is  even 
more  short-sighted.  It  guides  its  soul  away  from 
the  instinctive  vision  of  whole-hearted  fraternal- 
ism  with  its  service  of  " good- will  toward  man," 
through  the  narrow  confines  of  self -satisfied  right- 
eousness, making  possible  that  soul-choking  "  bet- 
ter than  thou ' '  attitude.  It  holds  eternally  before 
the  gaze  the  mockery  of  a  personal  salvation  which 
disregards  the  joys,  the  rights,  and  the  ideals  of 
others.  Most  of  us  are  satisfied  with  the  conven- 
tional conscience,  the  conscience  which  fits  the 
ideas  of  our  set,  of  the  day  and  age  in  which  we 
happen  to  be  living,  of  the  denomination  to  which 
we  belong,  of  the  standards  of  our  employer  or 
the  platforms  of  our  party,  of  the  decisions  of  the 
court  or  the  exactions  of  our  state  laws.  Conven- 
tional conscience  works  very  harmoniously  with 
utilitarian  morality. 

A  few  who  will  always  appear  choice,  are 
guided  by  the  esthetic  conscience,  the  conscience 
which  demands  beauty  of  thought  and  beauty  of 
expression  and  beauty  of  conduct.  It  is  too  bad 
that  beauty,  with  all  its  charm  of  appeal,  with  all 
its  cost  of  restraint  and  effort,  cannot  stand  as 
a  high  expression  of  soul-development.  An  in- 


280        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

timate  knowledge  of  the  lives  of  Byron,  Wagner, 
Oscar  Wilde  and  other  masters  of  beauty  of  form, 
word  or  tone,  of  many  whose  powers  of  eloquence 
have  swayed  multitudes,  has  mercilessly  sustained 
the  assertion  that  art,  beauty,  esthetics,  given  in 
their  highest  expression,  do  not  make  men  good, 
nor  necessarily  have  their  origin  in  good  men. 
The  esthetic  conscience  does  not  save  man  from 
himself. 

Of  the  perverted  forms  of  conscience  most  com- 
monly found  as  a  damaging  influence  in  the  nerv- 
ous life,  the  morbid  conscience  is  the  most  in- 
veterate offender.  The  morbid  conscience  is  an 
overworked  conscience,  is  a  conscience  which 
insists  upon  injecting  itself  critically,  censor- 
iously, painfully,  into  all  of  life's  activities.  The 
morbid  conscience  erects  artificial  standards  of  its 
own.  Refusing  to  accept  simple  truth  as  such, 
it  industriously  perverts  it  into  forms  of  its  own 
liking.  We  are  reminded  of  the  evangelist  who, 
when  given  a  trip  abroad,  covered  his  eyes  as 
he  ascended  the  Ehine,  that  the  entrancing  beau- 
ties of  that  noble  river  might  not  entice  him  away 
from  thoughts  spiritual,  and  reduce  him  to  mere 
worldly-mindedness.  Overconscientiousness  loads 
the  mind  with  scruples  which  are  but  the  husks 
of  goodness.  Morbid  conscientiousness  either 
cheats  the  soul  by  introducing  the  morally 
grotesque,  or  agitates  it  by  a  wasteful  intensity 
which  would  blind  judgment  and  use  feeling  alone 
as  its  messenger.  The  morbid  conscience  may  be 
crudely  selfish  or  fanatically  unselfish.  And 
finally,  this  perverted  interpreter  of  life's  truth 


DISCORD  WITH  SELF  281 

would  ever  keep  its  soul  wallowing  in  the  Slough 
of  Despond  through  its  persistence  in  holding 
before  our  eyes  the  evil  we  have  done,  causing 
us  to  relentlessly  punish  ourselves,  and  losing  for 
us  that  blessing  which  we  all  need,  that  great 
inspiration  which  comes  when  we  learn  to  cherish 
our  good.  The  leadership  of  our  virtues  will 
ever  carry  us  further  in  the  great  conflict  of  life, 
will  select  for  us  more  wisely  beneficent  adjust- 
ments than  we  can  ever  reach  through  a  morbid 
reiteration  of  the  wrong  we  have  done,  and  the 
mistakes  we  have  made.  Man  is  a  mixture  of 
good  and  bad.  Many,  through  morbid  conscience, 
have  long  since  given  up  the  hope  of  being  any- 
thing but  unutterably  evil,  here,  hereafter  and 
forevermore.  Yet  on  the  other  hand  we  meet 
those  who  for  years  have  believed  that  they  sin 
not,  that  through  some  special  series  of  personal 
manifestations  of  Providential  interest,  they  are 
so  utterly  good  that  sin  literally  cannot  find  a 
sticking  place  on  their  devout  hides. 

The  impression  that  there  is  not  a  helpful  con- 
sciousness of  our  wrong  doing  should  not  obtain 
for  a  moment.  A  conscience  is  indeed  defective 
in  its  essential  element  as  interpreter  of  truth, 
which  does  not  tell  us  frankly  and  forcibly  and 
clearly  when  we  have  wronged  the  best  within  us. 
But  morbid  conscientiousness  is  fatal  to  moral 
health,  and  moral  health  profoundly  influences 
nervous  health. 

In  the  chaos  of  human  development  there  is 
such  an  infinitude  of  nearby  interests,  there  are 
so  many  appealing  reactions  which  promise  in- 


282        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

stant  returns  of  physical  comfort,  or  mental  ease, 
or  esthetic  enjoyment,  that  it  is  small  wonder  that 
so  many  slip  through  the  beckoning  years  of 
youth  and  the  commanding  years  of  maturity,  and 
not  till  age  approaches  do  they  realise  that  their 
soul  self  has  persistently  ignored  the  inner  voice. 
Then  as  the  fires  burn  low  and  the  watcher  sits 
alone  by  the  darkening  embers  and  looks  within, 
he  sees  but  a  small  soul — a  wrinkled  soul ;  he  sees 
the  explanation  for  the  restless,  uneasy  years  of 
the  past;  he  recognises  the  reason  for  his  present 
sad  plight,  that  pitiable  plight  of  an  empty, 
wretched  old  age. 

Consciousness  of  evil,  no  matter  when  it  comes, 
must  ever  be  accepted  as  a  mark  of  progress,  as 
the  opening  of  a  better  way.  But  whether  con- 
science shall  prove  the  whip  of  scorpions,  multi- 
plying the  miseries  of  existence,  or  a  divine  mes- 
senger bearing  tidings  of  peace,  will  ever  rest  in 
that  adjustment  of  infinite  import  which  deter- 
mines whether  we  are  slaves  or  victors  of  self. 


CHAPTEE  XXI 
SUBLIMATION  OF  STRIFE 

Selfish  Strife. — Man  has  developed  tremen- 
dously in  his  own  estimation  since  he  frantically 
climbed  trees,  and  ducked  in  palpitating  panic  into 
the  welcome  darkness  of  some  opportune  cave, 
to  save  his  precarious  life  from  some  lumbering, 
intent  quadruped.  In  these  days  of  pride  of 
clothes,  pride  of  intellect  and  pride  of  comfort, 
he  disputes  his  very  Creator,  the  I  has  outgrown 
the  you,  and  he  ignores  the  Him.  Man  has  much 
and  he  knows  much,  and  has  egotistically  fallen 
into  the  habit  of  estimating  his  worth  by  his  pos- 
sessions and  his  reputation.  The  dollars  he  can 
count,  the  size  of  his  factory's  output,  the  flatter- 
ing opinions  he  can  secure,  all  too  commonly  have 
an  excessive  value  in  his  estimation,  while  what 
he  truly  is  remains  a  matter  to  be  dismissed 
promptly  as  an  uneasy  contemplation.  Even  in 
the  multiplicity  of  his  holdings,  desire  is  rarely 
sated.  On  the  contrary,  having  things  seems  to 
beget  an  itch  for  more  things,  until  the  piled-up 
possessions  of  the  average  1 1 successful' '  person, 
as  compared  to  his  legitimate  and  wholesome 
needs,  have  long  ago  passed  into  the  category  of 
absurdities. 

Each  dollar  owned  or  represented  in  chattels 
unquestionably  stands  for  a  definite  amount  of 

283 


284        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

condensed  power.  But  when  the  real  needs  of 
the  man  are  counted,  how  few  of  these  dollars 
he  can  truly  own — superficial  possession,  yes — 
but  his  actual  personal  utilisation  will  be  ever- 
lastingly limited.  Still  desire  eggs  him  on,  ever 
eloquent  in  suggesting  reasons  for  the  more,  ever 
greedy  to  equal  or  surpass  neighbour  or  com- 
petitor, ever  giving  a  false  direction  to  that 
superb  quality  of  energy  which  is  mankind's — a 
direction  which  ends  in  the  deadening  strife  for 
possessions.  Even  crude  desire  helps  blind  the 
eyes  of  most  of  us  to  the  simplicity  of  our  legiti- 
mate needs,  and  causes  us  to  eat  three  times  the 
food  which  the  brain-working  body  can  bene- 
ficially utilise,  while  our  wives  demand  five  times 
the  amount  for  clothing  that  unselfish,  self-for- 
getting honesty,  in  this  world  of  unequal  distri- 
bution of  luxury  and  destitution,  should  allow. 
And  yet,  to  the  struggling,  striving,  fighting, 
intense  many,  there  is  no  stopping-place.  Frenzy 
for  acquisition,  craze  for  possession,  is  the  miser- 
able story  of  all  too  many  in  their  unsated  gamble 
with  life,  is  their  highest  expression  of  the  inher- 
ent human  power  of  overcoming.  The  superb 
fighting  instinct  rises  no  higher  than  the  "I  want" 
of  self.  But  when  all  has  been  counted  and 
triumphantly  piled  away  in  safe-deposit  boxes, 
the  break  comes,  that  change  which  creates  a  new 
order  of  existence  wherein  all  of  the  trickery  of 
close  trading,  all  the  steel-nerved  generalship  of 
high  finance,  all  the  gripping,  gouging  tactics  of 
soulless  capital,  are  useless  assets,  are  but  smoth- 
ering, stifling  memories, 


SUBLIMATION  OF  STRIFE  285 

Desire  for  possession  barely  outdistances,  in  the 
great  strife  for  self,  the  stimulation  which  pride 
of  externals  lays  upon  humankind.  From  the 
pathetic  strut  of  the  Borneo  chief,  clad  in  a  bat- 
tered stovepipe  hat,  and  a  grin  of  superiority, 
through  the  various  walks  and  orders  of  life,  men 
and  women  strain  to  produce  effects,  most  of 
which  possess  no  more  true  merit  than  the  puerile 
dignity  of  the  behatted  Borneo.  It  would  seem 
that  for  many  the  art  of  living  is  expressed  in 
how  we  look,  what  we  wear,  what  is  said  of  us,  in 
what  we  say  and  how  we  inflect  it,  in  whom  we 
know  and  how  frequently  they  entertain  us.  And 
for  these  things  we  strive  from  the  kindergarten 
on,  while  what  we  are,  what  we  have  done  and 
are  doing  to  that  sacred  inner  self,  is  considered 
only  during  what  we  call  our  " morbid  moments," 
— those  rare  occasions  when  some  cataclysmic 
interruption  to  our  comfortable  journey  through 
life  brings  us  face  to  face  with  questions  eternal. 
We  fairly  trample  over  each  other  in  our  selfish 
scramble  for  fame,  deriding  and  discrediting  those 
who  surpass,  struggling  and  striving  to  keep 
ahead,  envying — even  hating — those  who  press  us 
closely.  We  barter  the  satisfying,  inspiring  pride 
in  existence  for  a  cheap,  evanescent,  palling  pride 
of  appearance.  We  may  discount  ourselves,  for 
effect,  to  auditors  whom  we  would  despise  should 
we  hear  them  express  the  same  opinion  of  us. 
We  have  allowed  pride  in  our  individuality  to 
grow  until  covertly,  if  not  openly,  we  resent  cor- 
rection, till  our  blood  fairly  boils  under  the  heat 
of  criticism;  and  hot  words  and  cold  words,  and 


286        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

sarcasm  and  ridicule  and  invective,  and  biting 
retort,  with  acrid  argumentation  and  disputatious 
contentions,  are  the  worthy  weapons  with  which 
we  strive  to  maintain  pride  of  self. 

Unavoidable  Battles. — We  have  glanced  for  a 
moment  at  mankind  seething  in  the  grip  of  selfish 
strife.  The  uselessness,  the  waste,  the  utter 
weariness  of  it  all  is  oppressing,  and  the  yearn- 
ing comes  to  slip  into  some  quiet  nook  of  exist- 
ence, and  simply,  quietly  while  away  the  days, 
far  from  the  toil,  the  hurly-burly,  away  from  the 
contention  and  acrimony — safe,  alone  and  at 
peace.  But  it  may  not  be  so.  Much  is  said  of  the 
seal  of  heredity.  Environment  is  credited  with 
magician's  powers;  but  the  real  master  of  life  is 
the  soul,  is  that  wonderful  inner  power  which  is 
the  true  creator  of  what  we  are,  and  of  the  uni- 
verse in  which  we  live.  To  the  ignorant  soul, 
the  world  is  but  a  small  plot  of  landscape ;  to  the 
ignorant,  superstitious  soul,  it  is  peopled  with 
pursuing  spirits  of  destruction.  To  the  sordid 
soul,  the  world  is  heartless  and  selfish;  to  the 
hating  soul,  it  is  a  den  of  malevolence.  To  the 
educated  soul,  this  same  world  is  a  perfect  system 
of  coordinated  law.  To  the  religious  soul,  good- 
ness is  inherent  in  all.  To  the  artistic  soul,  beauty 
lurks  allwhere,  begging  to  be  uncovered.  To  the 
philosophic  soul,  law  and  order,  and  right  and 
ultimate  righteousness  exist,  latent  or  manifest, 
in  all  mankind.  What  we  are  within  determines 
what  we  shall  see  and  feel,  what  we  shall  select 
and  to  what  we  shall  attend,  and  herein  is  the 
basis  of  the  true  ego.  Life  is  so  much  raw  ma- 


SUBLIMATION  OF  STRIFE  287 

terial  which,  acted  upon  by  the  inner  self,  becomes 
character.  There  is  no  escaping  the  conclusion 
that  the  soul  of  man  is  an  omnipotent  force  which 
creates  its  own  environment,  its  own  atmosphere, 
its  own  happiness,  its  own  eternity ;  and,  whether 
in  the  mad  mob  of  selfish  strife  or  in  utter  lone- 
liness, man's  better  nature  is  ever  called  upon  to 
make  adjustments.  No  placid  inertness  will  bring 
content,  no  unthought  indolence  will  procure  sat- 
isfaction. To  every  life  worthy  the  name  come 
battles  of  adjustment,  the  decisions,  the  choices, 
the  selection  of  the  principles  of  existence,  the 
election  of  right  or  wrong. 

One  of  the  earliest  of  life's  inevitable  battles 
is  the  assertion  of  our  wants,  as  opposed  to  our 
needs.  Wants  are  insatiable;  needs  are  simple. 
Wants  dominate  and  demand;  needs  lead  and 
develop.  Wants  deceive  and  overload;  needs  re- 
veal and  strengthen.  And  so  the  fight  for  the 
useless  or  for  that  which  truly  counts,  is  really 
the  fight  which  determines  whether  the  life  shall 
be  one  of  confusion,  with  strain  of  strife,  or  of 
order,  and  the  comfort  of  satisfaction.  In  re- 
sponding to  the  call  of  wants,  we  fight  in  the 
ranks  for  misery.  In  limiting  our  strife  to  our 
needs,  we  battle  for  happiness.  Fight  man  must, 
or  he  is  no  man.  Fight  he  must,  or  he  remains 
an  undeveloped  weakling.  It  is  not  a  question 
of  fighting,  but  it  is  a  question  of  what  he  shall 
fight.  Duty  must  often  be  at  sword's  points  with 
Desire,  and  the  demands  of  these  two  frequently 
make  a  bloody  battle-ground  of  the  soul.  Desire 
is  a  force  usually  selfish,  commonly  reckless — a 


288        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

wilful  power,  hotly,  madly  resenting  Duty's  firm 
"Halt!"  And  many  lives  are  spent  in  wasteful 
disputations,  because  Duty  has  not  been  reinforced 
by  principles  which  are  inviolate. 

Each  life  finds  its  peace  beset  with  special  diffi- 
culties. Self-pity  ever  calls  for  humiliating  sur- 
renders— it  is  a  traitor  to  honourable  peace. 
Undue  self-interest  is  ever  content  with  small 
victories,  so  it  is  a  poor  fighter  in  life's  larger 
battles.  Impatience  and  depression  and  ignoble 
fear  and  hate  are  mutinous  members  of  life's 
army,  which  have  a  tenacious,  peace-destroying 
hold  upon  existence.  Pride  must  be  fought  with 
accomplishment.  There  is  a  worthy  pride  in 
wholesome  doing,  which  well  displaces  the  pride 
in  possession,  the  pride  in  appearance,  the  pride 
of  pretence.  Fortune  and  misfortune  alike  tempt 
the  soul  to  unworthy  surrender — fortune  with  its 
mockery  of  plenty,  misfortune  with  its  taunt  of 
injustice.  If  a  rational  adjustment  to  life's  facts 
is  to  be  made,  the  snobbish  ego  must  give  way 
to  a  wholesome  acceptance  of  personal  limitations. 
License  which  masquerades  as  liberty  must  give 
way  to  restraint  of  desire,  of  false  pride,  of  selfish 
egotism,  for  restraint  is  essential  to  that  genuine 
freedom  which  may  be  rightfully  called  liberty. 
The  so-called  liberty  of  license  simply  creates 
slaves  of  desire,  while  the  liberty  of  restraint 
develops  the  mastery  of  self-control.  Disciplined 
freedom  alone  is  righteous  freedom. 

In  the  weak,  the  susceptible,  the  morbid,  fre- 
quently arise  questions  of  eternal  justice.  By 
the  strong,  during  the  hours  of  deep  adversity,  or 


SUBLIMATION  OF  STRIFE  289 

in  the  black  midnight  of  despair,  the  possibility 
of  divine  justice  is  questioned.  Indeed,  to  all 
mankind  come  problems  of  the  future,  and  we 
seem  mere  prisoners,  with  the  relentless  walls 
of  time  gradually  closing  in  upon  our  hapless 
souls.  Now  the  vanity  of  worldly  values,  the 
emptiness  of  selfish  pride,  are  obvious.  Our 
knowledge  fails,  our  reason  falters,  and  all  our 
strivings  and  denyings  and  our  worthy  fightings 
seem  vain.  But  man's  soul  has  other  possessions 
than  absolute  knowledge  or  the  demonstrations 
of  reason,  for  faith  and  hope  have  been  given 
him  as  wings  to  carry  him  over  his  narrowing 
prison  walls  into  the  freedom  which  accepts  no 
temporal  limitations.  Faith  is  that  quality  with- 
out which  many  suffering  nervously  will  never 
know  peace, — but  it  must  be  a  faith  which  turns 
from  selfishness  to  goodness,  a  faith  which  strikes 
off  the  manacles  of  fear,  which  lays  hold  upon 
and  honours  the  good  in  self,  with  a  resolution 
which  will  not  be  denied;  a  faith  which  develops 
the  fighting  strength  through  a  willingness  to 
use  it  valiantly  and  fearlessly,  a  faith  which  looks 
away  from  error  to  right,  and  which  seeks  the 
lessons  in  wrongs  done,  and  realises  the  blessing 
in  forgiving  the  wrongs  received.  Such  faith  will 
cure  when  medicines  and  treatments  and  weari- 
some rests,  and  ill-advised  operations,  and  the 
laying  on  of  mercenary  hands,  and  the  application 
of  patented  oils  of  gladness,  have  failed.  These 
and  uncounted  other  mechanical  and  medicinal 
procedures  have  failed,  as  they  ever  will  fail,  to 
help  a  great  throng  of  the  nervous,  whose  illness 


290        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

is  not  of  body  nor  of  mind,  but  is  a  sickness  of 
the  soul.  Such  illness  is  moral  illness,  born  of 
an  unworthy  strife  with  right,  is  a  result  of  self- 
gratifying  rebellions  with  the  voice  of  good,  is 
fever  and  pain  and  restlessness  coming  through 
the  contamination  of  unholy  acts  or  self-inflicted 
infections. 

The  Strife  that  Saves. — Sometime  since  it  was 
suggested  that  man's  soul  was  not  intended  to 
float  to  Heaven  on  "flowery  beds  of  ease." 
When  the  average  man  with  nervous  ailments 
takes  stock  of  his  true  self,  the  conviction  is  usu- 
ally forthcoming  that  there  is  a  big  work  for  his 
soul  to  do.  His  temperament,  for  instance,  needs 
changing — which  is  usually  some  job — in  fact, 
such  a  job  that  the  quitter  says  '  '  It  can 't  be  done. ' ' 
But  the  quitter  is  one  who  usually  tries  the  short 
cuts  in  life,  and  finds  himself  in  a  bog.  Few  of 
us  enter  into  the  press  of  life  with  a  temperament 
ready-made  to  meet  all  the  requirements  of  de- 
velopment, without  undergoing  fundamental  mod- 
ifications. Let  us  take,  for  instance,  the  morbid 
temperament,  with  its  ever  reiterated  depressions, 
its  woful  outlook  on  life,  its  miserable  retrospec- 
tions. With  such  a  possession  the  fight  for  cheer 
constitutes  one  of  those  examples  of  that  intense 
strife  that  saves.  Knowledge  will  teach  one  so 
fighting  to  earnestly  question  the  powers  of  de- 
pression which  darken  his  days.  All  have  bur- 
dens ;  therefore,  reason  will  suggest  that  burdens 
are  not  necessarily  causes  for  unhappiness,  but 
more  probably  opportunities  for  overcoming. 
Common  sense  will  demand  that  self  be  accepted 


SUBLIMATION  OF  STRIFE  291 

cheerfully,  not  mournfully.  Will  announces  the 
need  for  training  in  enjoyment,  and  clings  to  the 
attitude  of  cheer  in  spite  of  the  demands  of  the 
morose,  the  self -pitying  and  the  unworthily  emo- 
tional. A  few  weeks  of  earnest  effort  toward 
cheer  will  find  the  striver  at  least  facing  in  the 
right  direction,  looking  toward  the  sunlight  and 
away  from  the  shadow.  It  is  given  the  human 
soul  to  maintain  a  consistent,  consecrated  rebel- 
lion against  the  tyranny  of  depression,  until  habits 
of  cheer  thought,  of  cheer  feeling  and  of  cheer 
expression  have  been  attained.  Much  morbidness 
is  simply  a  spineless  slipping  back  on  the  hard 
upward  path  to  an  easy  lounging  place.  While 
none  of  us  can  modify  the  product  of  the  weather 
man,  all  but  the  seriously  toxic  or  volitionally  de- 
fective may  command  their  own  internal  weather, 
so  that  while  the  storm  buffets  without,  the  spirit 
within  may  be  calm  and  serene. 

The  human  soul  is  like  the  roots  of  a  plant, 
which  reach  down  into  the  soil  and  select  the 
substances  which  are  to  be  converted  into  trunk, 
and  stem,  and  leaf,  and  bloom,  and  fruit  and  fra- 
grance. The  oak  root  deliberately  and  unerringly 
selects  toughness,  and  strength,  and  stores  up 
warmth  and  protection.  The  root  of  the  vine  bur- 
rows far  for  the  juicy  sweetness  of  its  fruit.  The 
lily's  roots  select  from  the  black  muck  in  which 
they  find  themselves,  fragrance,  and  the  whiteness 
of  purity.  Even  so  the  soul  dips  into  human 
experience  and  finds  hope  in  adversity,  transforms 
pain  into  strength-giving  power,  finds  fairness  in 
play  and  happiness  in  work,  and  recognises  and 


292        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

accepts  and  profits  by  the  blessings  in  drudgery. 
The  soul  may  transform  the  catastrophes  of  ex- 
perience into  the  character  which  endures,  for  it 
is  not  the  catastrophe,  but  what  we  do  with  the 
catastrophe,  that  counts.  Such  is  the  soul's 
selecting  power,  a  power  which  may  plunge  life 
into  chaotic  strife,  breed  unhappiness,  discontent 
and  heartache,  or  may  choose  to  convert  the  raw 
material  of  experience  into  power,  peace  and 
spiritual  plenty. 

The  strife  that  saves  early  recognises  the  limit- 
ations of  all  human  power,  and  accepts  the  re- 
nunciations which  eliminate  damaging  strife.  The 
nature  which  holds  fast  to  ordinary  rebellion 
looks  upon  renunciation  as  an  evidence  of  indiffer- 
ence, or  of  mere  weak  will.  But  renunciation 
abides  in  all  selection.  Every  choice  means  the 
surrender  of  many  things  for  one.  The  monarch 
renounces  privacy,  the  relaxation  of  informality 
and  simplicity,  the  soul-satisfying  comforts  of  the 
modest  home  life,  for  the  pomp  and  circumstance, 
for  the  wearying  splendour  and  the  exacting 
formalities  of  his  kinghood.  The  student  re- 
nounces the  interests  of  the  street,  the  stimulation 
of  society,  the  joys  of  the  theatre  and  ballroom, 
during  months  and  years,  and  emerges  from  his 
study  wan,  wearied  and  worn,  that  he  may  pos- 
sess power  of  mind.  Many  hours,  daily,  of  exact- 
ing, relentless  practice  and  study,  with  renuncia- 
tion for  ten  or  fifteen  years  of  most  of  life's  so- 
called  pleasures,  is  the  price  paid  by  the  musician 
for  the  perfection  of  touch,  the  delicacy  of 
expression,  the  peculiar  clearness,  depth  and 


SUBLIMATION  OF  STRIFE  293 

sweetness  of  tone,  which  make  the  master.  True 
reunciation  always  implies  a  strife  with  those 
things  which  lure  and  tempt,  but  it  is  in  the 
strength  born  of  this  strife,  the  giving  up  of  the 
now  for  the  future,  that  liberty  and  power  are 
won,  and  ultimate  defeat  and  suffering  are 
avoided. 

In  the  fight  for  character,  nature  is  a  rough 
teacher.  An  intimate  study  of  great  men  and 
women  reveals  tragedies  of  denial,  years  of  what 
the  weaker  of  us  would  call  agony  of  privation,  or 
an  intensity  of  effort  which  we  would  resent  as 
slavish.  Again  reason  should  show  us  that  co- 
operation is  not  slavery,  not  servility,  but  that  it 
ever  assumes  individuality.  When  we  finally 
learn  to  accept  Nature's  terms,  and  work  her 
way,  cooperate  with  her  forces — then  we  work 
miracles.  The  difficulties  of  existence  are  Na- 
ture's great  gymnasium  of  the  soul.  The  will  is 
the  backbone  of  the  moral  nature,  developed  only 
through  striving.  Each  one  has  his  call  to  work. 
It  is  always  a  near  call  first,  but  the  dreamer 
and  the  sentimentalist  are  not  aroused  by  the 
voice  of  homely  duties;  they  wait  for  that  far 
cry  which  would  take  them  into  the  mysterious, 
enchanting  beyond,  and  waiting  for  the  inspiring, 
for  the  beautiful,  they  fail  to  find  the  good  ever 
at  hand. 

The  supreme  value  of  volition  is  seen  as  we 
recognise  that  it  practically  forges  our  destiny. 
We  all  have  good — some  good — and  it  is  too  often 
our  shame  that  we  rest  satisfied  in  the  some  which 
we  have;  that  we  use  it  as  a  mantle  to  hide  our 


294        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

less  good,  to  conceal  our  evil.  Meanwhile  that 
spirit  of  strife,  planted  deep  within  our  breasts 
to  save  us  from  our  weaknesses,  surrenders  and 
conceits,  would  have  us  join  good  to  good,  or  as 
we  were  formerly  admonished,  to  '  '  grow  in  grace. ' ' 
And  in  thus  perfecting  our  personalities,  we  early 
make  them  proof  against  possible  nervous  damage 
growing  out  of  rebellions  injurious  to  the  moral 
nature.  Striving  for  wealth  will  bring  us  that 
which  will  ultimately  prove  but  dross.  The  learn- 
ing of  the  savant  brings  no  warmth  of  heart.  The 
most  flattering  successes  of  a  brilliant  social  sea- 
son are  paid  for  in  the  sufferings  of  envy,  and 
jealousy  and  heartaches.  The  conquering  hero 
returns,  to  be  ignominiously  dragged  from  his 
pedestal  because  of  some  immaterial  slip  which 
offends  popular  opinion.  The  voice  of  the  prima 
donna  ultimately  loses  its  exquisite  fulness,  and 
critics  and  public  turn  away  to  proclaim  the  new, 
young  songstress  queen,  instead.  Wealth,  learn- 
ing, brilliancy,  heroism,  art — striven  for,  sacri- 
ficed for,  lived  for — even  when  attained,  are  not 
adequate  to  satisfy  the  inner  life.  The  only  cer- 
tain success  that  can  come  to  humankind  abides 
in  that  purification,  that  sublimation  of  strife, 
which  is  found  in  the  battle  for  the  ever-better, 
which  will  unerringly  lead  to  that  one  supreme 
human  accomplishment — the  development  of  a 
beautiful  soul. 


CHAPTER  XXII 
THE  FULFILMENT  OF  SELF 

Life's  Failures. — As  we  have  studied  the  various 
complexities  in  which  we  find  the  nervous  victim 
entangled  in  his  struggle  for  adjustment,  it  has 
become  increasingly  obvious  that  he  is  often  a 
puppet  of  his  own  forces.  His  keenly  responsive 
sensibilities  are  ever  starting  and  halting  and 
turning  about  to  the  jangle  of  calling,  command- 
ing, threatening,  abusive,  encouraging  tongues, 
until  he  feels  but  a  distraught,  wretched  victim 
of  circumstance.  And  such  indeed  he  often  is, 
and  must  so  remain  until  the  understanding  self 
points  out  his  basic  weaknesses ;  and  an  abidingly 
resolute  self  holds  him  steadfast  in  his  wisely 
chosen  new  course  of  life,  until  he  passes  beyond 
confusion  of  thought  and  feeling  and  willing  to 
that  abiding  victory — a  reasoned  self-mastery. 

Along  the  highway  are  scattered  many  who  fail. 
Some  who  cannot  or  will  not  go  on  have  sunk 
down  discouraged  and  hopeless.  Some,  cheaply 
satisfied,  miserably  content,  have  gone  as  far  as 
they  planned,  and  many  of  these  will  be  seen 
shamelessly  erecting  altars,  at  which  they  regu- 
larly kneel  in  worship  of  the  great  god  Comfort; 
and  in  this  very  false  worship  exists  their  failure 
to  find  peace.  Others  quit  the  upward  road 

295 


296        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

through  the  short-sightedness  which  chooses  the 
blossom  that  wilts  with  the  day,  the  fruit  which 
but  tantalises  the  palate;  which  seeks  the  cool 
of  the  shade  where  follows  the  midnight  chill. 
They  grasp  the  thing  at  hand  rather  than  develop 
the  character  which  needs  not  tangible  possessions 
nor  visible  friends,  but  in  the  great  wealth  of  its 
own  strength  and  faith,  is,  and  forever  shall  be, 
superior  to  passing  needs.  Thus  many  turn  aside 
from  the  exacting  path  which  the  experience  of 
all  time  points  out  as  the  only  one  leading  to  the 
City  of  Abiding  Joy,  and  allow  their  best  selves 
to  idle  away  year  after  year  of  those  days  that 
were  given  to  make  man  failure-proof. 

Still  others  meander  along,  ignorantly,  unthink- 
ingly. These  are  they  who  are  living  mechani- 
cally, not  recognising,  or  thoughtlessly  ignoring, 
the  call  of  inspiration,  the  leadership  of  higher 
ambition,  the  reiterated  pleadings  of  the  inner, 
better  voice.  They  note  only  the  stifling  dust  of 
the  journey,  the  pebbles  which  annoy,  the  rocks 
over  which  they  stumble,  the  swelter  of  the  day, 
the  tug  of  the  upward  pull.  They  are  reacting 
with  machine-like  autonomy  to  the  happenings  of 
the  hour.  Scrutinising  these  stragglers,  we  see 
many  hopeless  faces,  and  slouching,  dejected, 
wearied  forms  dragging  unwilling  steps,  or  sul- 
lenly and  doggedly  turning  their  backs  upon  the 
haven  for  which  they  started.  Here  is  pessimism 
— the  pessimism  of  despair,  which  stands  inevita- 
bly for  failure  in  life's  adjustment.  Despair  in 
loss  is  one  of  mankind's  most  certain  defeats. 
Earnest  thought  will  convince  us  that  human 


THE  FULFILMENT  OF  SELF  297 

existence,  from  the  standpoint  of  possessions,  of 
friendships,  of  health  and  ability,  is  a  foreordained 
failure — a  deliberately  planned  tenure  of  life  dur- 
ing which  people,  things,  and  self  have  been 
placed  in  the  soul's  hands  to  be  used  for  its  devel- 
opment toward  perfection.  The  giving  and  the 
taking,  and  the  having  and  the  holding  of  all  save 
the  soul's  own  strength  are  matters  which,  even 
in  the  hands  of  the  strongest,  are  for  but  a  few 
numbered  days. 

One  of  the  most  alluring  of  modern  man's  temp- 
tations, into  which  those  of  keenly  responsive 
nervous  temperament  are  particularly  prone  to 
fall,  these  days  of  marvellous  intellectual  oppor- 
tunities, is  the  exclusive  cultivation  of  the  brain, 
while  the  soul  remains  unnoticed  and  neglected. 
Superficially,  the  rewards  which  art  and  mechan- 
ics, finance  and  the  professions,  science  and  his- 
tory, hold  out  to  the  supermind,  should  be  all- 
satisfying.  But  the  heart  beyond  that  supermind 
knows  its  own  neglect,  realises  how  narrow  and 
mean,  how  even  ugly  it  may  be,  when  compared 
to  the  spiritual  wholesomeness  of  some  simple- 
witted  artisan  neighbour.  And  when  the  value 
of  that  internal  peace  which  is  found  in  the  per- 
fect harmony  of  human  life  is  recognised,  the  ulti- 
mate victory  of  the  great  mind  with  an  undevel- 
oped soul  is  in  truth  a  small  one.  Too  frequently, 
when  the  searching  test  of  that  life  does  come, 
the  test  which  cannot  be  answered  by  syllogisms 
or  equations  or  formulae,  but  only  by  the  unques- 
tioned voice  of  the  hard,  pride-  and  ease-sacri- 
ficing, right  road,  the  master  intellect  will  probably 


298        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

choose  the  path  of  failure.  How  much  of  our  time 
and  painful  thoughtfulness,  our  patience,  our 
means,  our  vital  energies,  we  devote  to  the  culti- 
vation of  what  can  ever  be  but  our  second  best. 
Few  classes  of  life's  wayfarers  are  more  con- 
spicuous failures  than  those  who  spend  their  re- 
sources in  the  systematic  cultivation  of  pleasure. 
No  better  proof  can  exist  that  man  was  not  in- 
tended to  make  amusement  his  first  business  than 
the  ultimate  dreary  weariness  of  it  all,  and  the 
unnatural  excesses  which  wreck  body,  disorganise 
mind  and  stultify  the  soul,  so  constantly  seen  in 
the  life  of  the  selfish  pleasure-seeker. 

The  person  who  has  suffered  nervously  for  a 
number  of  years  and  retained  even  a  fair  degree 
of  unselfishness,  is  rare.  The  self-centredness, 
the  self-seeking,  the  self-pity,  the  self-indulgence 
of  the  nervously  inadequate,  create  monuments  of 
selfishness,  and  there  is  no  defeat  in  the  battle 
for  soul-supremacy  so  inevitably  certain  as  the 
defeat  of  the  selfish  self.  Life  is  rich  in  its  giving 
at  every  turn,  the  inner  nature  finds  abundant 
wealth  awaiting;  but  the  ability  to  receive  goes 
hand  in  hand  with  the  willingness  to  give.  Time 
must  be  given  that  the  power  of  patience  may 
come ;  control  must  be  exercised  that  the  strength 
of  temperance  may  fortify;  desires  must  be 
smothered  that  the  buoyancy  of  cheer  may  lighten 
the  load;  enmities  must  be  wrestled  with  and 
strangled  that  the  warmth  and  generosity  and  the 
inspiration  of  love  may  attend  each  step  of  the 
way.  Noisy  self-assertion,  with  the  vain  pride 
of  conceit,  must  be  subdued,  or  the  self  which 


THE  FULFILMENT  OF  SELF  299 

rules  time  and  events  will  never  come  to  its  throne. 
Training  for  Efficiency. — In  the  problem  stated 
at  the  beginning  of  our  study,  we  assumed  that 
the  normal,  earnest  man  or  woman  was  capable 
of  selecting  wisely  and  training  for  efficiency.  We 
have  repeatedly  seen  that  wisdom  in  selection  is 
dependent  upon  the  clear,  wholesome  thinking 
which  makes  it  possible  for  the  mind  to  elect  from 
the  great  mass  of  directions  and  misdirections 
placed  before  it  that  which  for  itself  is  most  cer- 
tainly true.  But  when  this  is  done,  we  have  but 
decided  upon  the  direction  we  are  to  take.  The 
long,  hard  journey,  demanding  denials  of  present 
comfort  and  expenditure  of  days  of  effort,  from 
which  results  seem  so  small,  is  ahead;  the  very 
conception  of  training  implies  consistent,  directed 
effort.  Eepeatedly  in  previous  pages  enemies  of 
man's  efficiency,  as  expressed  in  his  nervous 
health,  have  been  portrayed,  and  as  frequently 
those  qualities  which  are  his  to  develop  and  with 
which  he  may  overcome,  have  been  indicated.  In 
these  final  pages  we  are  realising  that,  immense 
as  life  is,  numerous  and  damaging  as  are  man's 
foes,  physical,  mental  and  moral,  man,  in  learning 
the  art  of  right  living  in  the  various  aspects  of 
his  nature,  is  bigger  than  his  problems,  that  his 
soul  is  more  potent  than  all  its  enemies.  But 
upon  this,  his  greatest  force,  he  so  seldom  relies. 
Too  frequently  he  is  found  straining  and  strug- 
gling with  his  problems,  facing  an  inevitable  de- 
feat, because  he  has  accumulated  so  little  soul 
energy,  he  has  depended  on  the  help  of  others, 
the  stimulation  of  drugs,  the  shrewdness  of  his 


300       THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

mind,  the  inherent  elasticity  and  resistance  of  his 
mental  powers.  He  has  trusted  in  the  things  of 
existence,  he  has  not  stored  up  that  vast  possible 
reserve  through  years  of  the  practice  of  peace, 
the  sanity  of  self-sacrifice,  the  economy  of  pa- 
tience, which  assure  to  him  a  momentum  ever 
unchecked  by  life's  so-called  defeats. 

One  of  the  greatest  secrets  of  successful  train- 
ing for  efficiency  resides  in  the  ceaseless  work  of 
unseen  builders.  Man  is  surrounded  by  monu- 
ments of  his  industry.  All  lands  are  dotted  with 
his  cities,  his  buildings  now  rear  skyward  in  mul- 
tiples of  twenty  stories,  his  pyramids  have  weath- 
ered the  storms  of  ages,  and  in  pride  and  poverty 
he  is  housed  in  a  hundred  million  homes.  But 
this  work  of  man's  hands,  spectacular  as  it  is, 
may  not  be  compared  with  that  produced  by  the 
microscopic  labours  of  the  marine  zoophytes. 
They  carpet  the  sea;  silently,  mysteriously,  they 
build  their  fortresses — the  coral  reefs,  hidden 
enemies  of  the  mariner.  Upon  their  shoulders 
are  reared  the  foundations  of  islands  richly  lux- 
uriant in  all  that  ministers  to  man's  physical  needs 
and  pleasures.  In  man's  own  life  the  constant 
unnoted  activities  of  his  subconscious  self  are 
irresistibly  constructive  in  their  ultimate  effect 
upon  his  character  growth.  The  ceaseless  accu- 
mulations of  low  thinking  and  high  thinking,  of 
noble  feeling  and  ill  feeling,  of  weak  willing  and 
strong  willing,  slipping  quickly,  silently  into  the 
apparently  forgotten,  often  escaping  the  censor- 
ship of  conscience,  are  held  under  the  surface  to 
form  reefs  to  wreck,  or  fertile  islands  to  provide 


THE  FULFILMENT  OF  SELF  301 

the  richness  of  life.  So  unconsciously,  inevitably, 
habits  of  right  thinking,  feeling  and  doing  decide 
the  fulness  and  perfection  of  ultimate  victory, 
while  it  is  as  inevitably  true  that  the  false,  the 
unworthy,  the  weak,  the  ignoble  in  thought  and  act 
may  accumulate  as  hidden  reefs  to  determine  final 
wreckage. 

No  one  can  be  certainly  efficient  who  does  not 
cultivate  a  first-hand  acquaintance  with  things 
and  people.  Much  of  our  knowledge  comes  to  us 
through  books,  but  reading  is  not  actual  contact. 
Much  reading  with  little  doing  develops  a  life  of 
false  valuations,  which  becomes  an  uncertain 
foundation  for  successful  soul  living.  There  is 
an  armchair  piety,  comfortable,  self-satisfied, 
superficially  beautiful,  which  is  as  practically  use- 
less in  the  storm  of  adversity,  as  helpless  in  the 
biting  need  of  an  unfortunate  neighbour,  as  the 
ancient  image  with  head  of  gold  and  feet  of  clay. 

To  the  one  who  has  earnestly  and  determinedly 
undertaken  self -training,  who  has  made  the  revo- 
lutionising decision  that  all  events,  great  and 
small,  shall  be  reacted  upon  by  his  inner-self 
righteously,  wholesomely,  constructively,  the  real- 
isation soon  comes  that  no  outside  influence  can 
ultimately  prove  superior  to  that  self  when  assert- 
ing its  best.  Henceforth,  small  disasters  become 
only  as  roughened  surfaces  against  which  he  whets 
his  wits.  Great  disasters  send  him  down  to  his 
foundations,  which  he  enlarges  and  strengthens 
with  the  rocks  hewn  from  the  granite  which  would 
have  crushed.  The  child  and  the  tyro  may  meet 
the  superficial  requirements  of  success;  it  takes 


302       THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

manhood  to  meet  and  overcome  failure.  None 
knows  his  real  strength  till  he  has  faced  failure 
and  tasted  the  bitterness  of  defeat.  Physical  and 
mental  suffering  and  soul  pain  come  to  all,  that 
endurance  may  be  developed,  for  without  this  the 
strength  which  conquers  can  never  be.  The 
master  man  laughs  in  the  face  of  personal  hurts, 
offences  fail  to  offend,  insults  fail  to  embitter; 
he  turns  with  shame  from  the  so-called  depths 
of  suffering;  for  him  honour  and  majesty  of  soul 
are  found  upon  the  heights  of  suffering. 

The  very  heavens  challenge  man  to  grow  in 
strength  and  power  through  his  struggle  with  the 
adversities  which  this  unfinished  world  and  its 
undeveloped  inhabitants  lay  upon  him.  To  the 
many  who  cry  out  in  their  weariness  of  life  at 
the  lack  of  interest  and  the  apparent  narrowness 
of  it  all,  there  can  be  but  one  answer.  No  self 
is  ever  fulfilled,  no  better  nature  is  ever  completely 
asserted,  without  wisely  selected  resolutions. 
Develop  self,  and  life  will  grow ;  increase  interests, 
and  interests  will  multiply ;  beautify  thought,  and 
the  world 's  magnificence  will  be  revealed ;  displace 
dislikes  with  charity  and  the  love  of  ministry,  and 
all  life  will  be  magnified  and  beautified. 

In  our  study  of  self  we  have  been  almost  con- 
fused by  the  many-sidedness  of  human  nature,  its 
many  avenues  for  development,  its  many  ap- 
proaches for  receiving  damage.  It  would  be  all 
mystifying,  and  the  training  for  efficiency  a  hope- 
less task  indeed,  were  it  not  for  that  wonderful 
mentor  within,  which  will  lead  so  truly  when  its 
better  directions  are  consistently  followed.  A 


THE  FULFILMENT  OF  SELF  303 

hopeless  problem  it  would  be,  were  not  the  answer 
found  in  the  direction  of  all  self-assertion  to  the 
development  of  that  one  best  self,  rather  than 
in  attempting  to  overcome  in  detail  the  multi- 
plicity of  life's  possible  reactions.  Such  self- 
assertion  will  inevitably,  if  not  checked,  or 
thwarted,  if  honestly  and  resolutely  followed, 
gradually  point  more  and  more  truly  toward  the 
pole-star  of  eternal  right.  So  the  whole  question 
of  training  for  efficiency  can  be  stripped  of  its 
apparent  superhuman  demands  with  the  realisa- 
tion that  if  one  does  the  best  he  knows,  and  is  able, 
in  training  the  body;  if  he  develops  his  mind  along 
simple,  wholesome  lines,  and  denies  the  soul  noth- 
ing which  can  add  to  its  unhampered,  unwarped 
development,  he  will  gradually  but  most  certainly 
attain  his  highest  possible  powers  of  efficiency. 

Finding  the  Victorious  Self. — If  the  conclusions 
of  the  foregoing  paragraphs  have  been  accepted, 
it  must  be  agreed  that,  inadequate  as  is  human 
existence  for  the  possession  of  universal  ease  and 
unending  pleasure,  for  the  preservation  of  youth 
and  fadeless  beauty,  it  has  every  provision  needful 
for  the  most  perfect  development  of  character. 
Failure  comes  so  frequently  because  we  do  not 
take  possession  of  that  self  which  has  been  given 
us;  because  we  neglect  the  life  of  unselfish  pur- 
pose, which  knows  not  the  smallness  of  surrender 
to  selfish  suffering.  The  habit  of  success  pays 
handsomely  in  a  compound  interest,  even  as  we 
have  found  how  wretchedly  certain  is  the  piled-up 
interest  of  defeat  through  surrender.  We  fail  to 
possess  ourselves  completely  because  we  are  not 


304        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

willing  to  put  forth  the  sustained  effort  of  self- 
control,  which  is  the  price  of  carrying  out  all 
developing  resolutions.  We  fail  to  take  posses- 
sion of  self  because  we  are  willing  to  entertain 
too  many  of  self's  enemies;  we  cherish  too  many 
beliefs  and  feelings  and  decisions  which  are  not 
compatible  with  worthy  self-respect. 

It  is  one  of  the  anomalies  of  soul-development 
that  only  in  caring  less  about  self  man  finds  his 
victorious  self.  He  may  object  that  selfish  desires 
have  been  so  deeply  implanted  that  they  must 
stand  for  significant  demand  and  need.  But  truly, 
desires  were  given  to  make  possible  the  virtue 
of  generosity,  to  exalt  man  to  superman  through 
the  miracle  of  self-forgetfulness.  No  one  has 
truly  possessed  self  who  is  satisfied  with  lopsided 
moral  development.  There  is  little  virtue  in 
abstaining  from  wine-drinking  when  one  grows 
periodically  drunk  on  wrath  and  hatred.  There 
is  little  worth  in  the  pious  hour  of  religious  service 
which  is  followed  by  a  week  of  peevish,  petulant 
irritability.  The  goodness  of  the  "  generous " 
donation  to  flood  sufferers,  or  war  orphans,  or 
poverty-pinched  unfortunates,  is  a  mockery  when 
it  represents  a  toll  of  widows'  mites,  the  hard- 
earned  savings  of  the  struggling  farmer,  or  the 
pitiful  pittances  of  servant  girls,  filched  through 
masterful  manipulations  of  the  markets. 

The  victorious  self  has  long  since  accepted  as 
an  inspiring  truism  that  "  every  worst  has  its 
best,"  and  that  its  continuous  victories  depend 
upon  its  never  failing  to  find  that  best.  It  finds 
strength  added  to  strength  in  its  persistent  efforts 


THE  FULFILMENT  OF  SELF  305 

to  minister,  to  carry  help  and  cheer,  and  thus 
it  becomes  a  most  consistently  and  constantly 
happy  self.  Looking  for  good  in  all  things,  it 
learns  more  and  more  the  art  of  recognising  and 
enjoying  all  good  things.  The  victorious  self  is 
the  truly  altruistic  self,  and  altruism  is  egoism 
perfected.  Such  a  self  makes  life  generous,  and 
in  so  doing  ultimately  finds  itself  abiding  in  the 
lap  of  bounty.  The  victorious  self  cannot  miss 
the  great  secret  of  living.  It  recognises  the 
horror  of  a  life  of  inert  idleness  in  a  palace,  com- 
pared to  which  toil  in  a  coal-cellar  would  be  heav- 
enly. Striving  for  productive  activity,  thought- 
less of  the  burden  of  possession,  and  saturating 
all  its  labour  with  friendship,  not  only  for  the 
doing  but  for  the  fellow-doer,  it  knows  that  there 
is  no  lasting  interest  outside  of  productive  work, 
and  that  such  activity  is  the  highest  expression 
of  faith  in  operation. 

The  victorious  soul  recognises  that  most  of  its 
problems  are  over  when  it  has  succeeded  in  filling 
self  with  the  energies  of  sacrifice,  of  justice  and 
of  love;  that  when  this  is  done,  the  power  and 
beauty  of  fine  living,  the  joy  of  deep  living,  have 
come.  Then  also  comes  the  realisation  that  one 
has  unchained  hidden  powers  within  his  soul  of 
which  he  formerly  had  no  consciousness — powers 
which  cause  his  life  to  move  onward  toward  its 
appointed  goal,  with  a  resistless  force.  Such  liv- 
ing is  like  the  great  wheel  of  an  engine,  which 
drives  thousands  of  machines  by  the  multiplied 
powers  of  its  actively  moving  rim,  while  at  its 
axis  all  is  peace  and  calm  and  quiet.  The  vie- 


306        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

torious  self  recognises  life  as  a  gift,  which  instead 
of  growing  darker  and  more  dreary,  may  acquire 
greater  beauty  and  value  daily;  instead  of  being 
designed  for  misery  and  misfortune  and  hatred 
and  discord  and  bitterness,  is  designed  to  develop 
in  the  highest  degree  the  very  best  of  manhood. 


CHAPTEB  XXHI 
HARMONY 

Life's  Aims. — Throughout  the  pages  of  our  dis- 
cussion in  which  the  details  of  physical  and  mental 
adjustment  have  been  considered,  hint  has  fol- 
lowed hint  of  the  individual's  certain  need  of  a 
moral  directorship.  When  earnestly  scrutinised, 
the  strivings  of  body  and  mind  for  their  selfish 
own  are  seen  to  lead  on  to  complexity,  perplexity, 
disorder  and  nervous  discord.  While  suggestions 
have  multiplied,  based  upon  simplicity  in  physical 
and  mental  living,  the  necessity  for  ultimate  con- 
trol by  the  moral  idea,  as  the  only  force  resolving 
the  dissonance  of  jangling  nerves  into  harmony, 
has  been  reiterated  with  an  undeniable  insistence. 
Were  man  but  an  artist's  manikin,  to  be  posed 
and  used  and  pushed  aside,  this  insistence  could 
never  be  a  reasonable  one.  But  he  has  been  given 
his  several  score  of  years,  free  to  do  his  worst 
with  them,  and  equally  free  to  do  his  best.  We 
have  repeatedly  noted  his  marvellous  activities 
and  crowned  him  unchallenged  king  of  his  sphere, 
but  truly,  how  insignificant  is  the  work  of  his 
hands,  even  when  directed  by  the  flashing  bril- 
liancy of  his  mind !  He  cuts  through  the  Isthmus, 
and  when  his  thousands  have  died  and  his  hun- 
dreds of  millions  have  been  spent,  his  canal  is 
but  a  rivulet  when  compared  with  Nature 's  water- 

307 


308        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

ways.  He  builds  him  piles  of  masonry  till  he 
proudly  looks  down  upon  the  very  clouds,  but 
when  he  matches  his  most  noble  structures  with 
Nature's  mountainous  buildings,  his  bravest 
efforts  appear  as  veritable  ant-hills.  He  extrava- 
gantly converts  the  stored-up  wealth  of  ages  into 
a  million  glinting  lights  to  create  his  "  Great 
White  Way,"  and  produces  but  a  ghastly  imita- 
tion of  the  resplendent  effulgence  of  the  orb  of 
day.  Truly  man  was  created  for  greater  than 
these — man  who,  with  all  his  physical  strenuosity 
barely  scratches  Nature's  face,  and  who,  with  the 
accumulation  of  ages  of  mental  intensity,  is  still 
unable  to  produce  a  single  new  atom  of  matter. 
Assuredly,  the  rationale  of  his  being  is  not  to  be 
explained  by  his  manipulations  of  things  or  the 
conjurings  of  his  intellect. 

But  when  he  conceives  his  superpower,  his  mir- 
aculous power  to  meet  disaster,  and  in  it  to  find 
profit,  to  face  defeat  after  defeat  and  therein 
acquire  faith  in  his  own  permanence,  to  live  for 
years  within  a  frail,  defective  body,  with  a  mind 
unable  to  respond  to  the  promptings  of  ambition 
and  inspiration,  and  thereby  take  on  the  greatness 
of  gentleness — the  conviction  comes  clear,  a  con- 
viction which  will  not  comfortably  stay  put  aside 
— that  life  is  intended  to  develop  a  noble  self. 
This  self  is  ever  free  from  servility  to  physical 
promptings  and  the  desires  of  the  hour,  is  above 
the  domineering  and  bulldozing  demands  of  self- 
gratifying  pretentious,  is  never  submerged,  or 
suffocated  by  the  black  fumes  rising  from  the 
combustion  of  internal  strife.  In  the  possibilities 


HARMONY  309 

of  the  developed  moral  life  is  found  the  only 
satisfying  answer  to  the  query  of  existence.  The 
moral  is  the  only  truly  comprehensive  life,  the 
only  life  which  accepts  responsibilities  in  every 
domain,  and  recognises  not  only  body  and  mind, 
but  accepts  the  spiritual  quality  as  well.  This 
sets  the  whole  man  to  work — body,  mind  and  soul 
— and  diligently  attending  to  his  adjustments, 
external  and  internal,  attains  harmonious  adapt- 
ability. The  possession  which  he  alone  can  build 
up  or  tear  down,  disfigure  or  beautify,  demoralise 
or  spiritualise,  is  that  self  which  was  given  him 
to  perfect.  This  he  may  develop  until  a  master- 
ful assurance  comes,  an  assurance  which  theory, 
ridicule  and  argument  can  never  displace,  that 
life,  with  all  its  wonderful  complexities,  its  mighty 
possibilities,  is  insufficient  to  contain  man  when 
his  higher  powers  are  truly  utilised. 

' '  God  gave  us  love.     Something  to  love 
He  lends  us ;  but  when  love  has  grown 
To  ripeness,  that  on  which  it  throve 
Palls  off,  and  love  is  left  alone." 

Life's  Adjustments. — The  theme  of  our  pages 
has  been  humanity's  adjustments  to  things,  people 
and  self.  Each  day  makes  a  thousand  demands 
upon  us  all.  Many  rush  through  life,  feverish 
and  panting,  and  drop  by  the  wayside,  exhausted 
and  defeated,  because  they  have  lacked  the  ability 
to  unify  experiences,  to  classify  and  place  in  order 
their  principles  of  adjustment,  to  simplify  the 
whole  business  of  multiplex  human  reactions  by 
reducing  them  to  the  simple,  unequivocal  basis 


310        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

of  the  best  right  they  know.  Few  there  are  who 
make  an  impartial  audit  of  their  book  of  life 
without  finding  a  startling  discrepancy  between 
the  actual  self  and  the  possible  self.  Many  accept 
this  stolidly,  more  ignore  it  recklessly,  the  ma- 
jority resist  the  implication  ingeniously.  Many 
of  the  finer  grade  of  the  nervous  are  unable  thus 
to  dispose  of  the  auditor's  findings,  and  so  the 
minor  strains  of  sejf-accusing  depression  enter 
to  produce  discord  in  life's  major  harmonies. 

The  possible  self  moulds  self;  the  actual  self 
is  often  but  putty  in  life's  hands — a  "victim  of 
circumstances."  Every  self  reaching  the  age  of 
accountability  has  chosen,  deliberately  or  thought- 
lessly, the  life  of  comfort  of  body,  or  the  life  of 
comfort  of  soul.  When  through  years  of  follow- 
ing the  former  choice  the  nervous  smash-up  has 
come,  then  the  possible  self,  ushered  in  by  clear 
thinking,  must  appeal  to  the  highest  qualities  of 
its  will  to  substitute  self-discipline  for  self-indul- 
gence. The  little  happenings  of  the  day,  the 
eventful  occurrences  of  the  year,  the  vital  ex- 
periences of  a  lifetime,  comprising  the  whole 
stock-in-trade  of  the  average  actual  self,  mean 
little  to  the  possible  self,  compared  to  the  mould- 
ing influence  which  this  self  allows  these  happen- 
ings, large  and  small,  to  exercise  over  it.  Apply- 
ing this  personally,  a  fundamental  conception  of 
life's  normal  adjustment  has  been  attained,  when 
I  realise  that  it  is  not  the  experience  which  is 
vital,  but  what  I  allow  it  to  do  with  me.  Hosts 
of  the  nervous  sit  trembling  at  life's  feast.  They 
have  not  attained  a  spiritual  disregard  for  bodily 


HARMONY  311 

feelings — that  one  practical  contribution  of  Chris- 
tian Science  teachings,  acceptance  of  which  has 
healed  many  of  the  nervous. 

Life  relentlessly  demands  another  adjustment — 
one  so  far-reaching  in  its  influence  as  to  determine 
the  weal  or  woe  of  most  of  her  children.  We 
press  hands,  we  touch  lips,  but  an  absolute  know- 
ing of  one  by  another  cannot  be.  Each  existence 
is  individual,  and  a  certain  gulf  of  loneliness  sur- 
rounds each  human  soul — to  cause  us  to  "eat, 
drink  and  be  merry, "  says  the  thoughtless;  to 
send  us  into  the  highways  and  byways  that  we 
may  forget  it  all  in  the  turmoil  of  competition, 
says  the  so-called  practical  man.  But  eating  and 
drinking  and  merrymaking,  nor  all  the  intensity 
of  days  on  'Change,  can  more  than  brush  aside 
for  the  hour  the  sense  of  isolation,  of  remoteness. 
Like  a  shadow  it  follows  to  darken  and  chill,  when 
the  false  fever  of  stimulation  has  gone.  Again 
the  thoughtful  man  sees  the  beckoning  hand  of 
the  higher  nature  pointing  to  the  something  better 
which  is  ever  waiting  to  be  wedded  to  life.  Each 
one  who  will  look  outward  and  upward  with  stead- 
fast purpose  will  recognise  that  this  something 
better  consists  of  life's  many  unused  beauties. 
Patience  and  thoughtfulness  and  gentleness  and 
increasing  capacity  for  friendship — that  true 
friendship  which  seeks  the  privilege  of  rendering 
service — these  are  beauties  wealthy  in  joys  pres- 
ent and  to  come,  eager  to  be  wedded  to  our  actual 
selves,  that  the  peace  and  trust  of  the  generosity- 
seeking  possible  self  may  be  attained. 

But  life  9s  crowning  adjustment  comes  when  the 


312        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

simplicity  and  harmony  of  spiritual  leadership  is 
accepted,  for  the  true  spiritual  seeks  the  best  in 
everything.  Our  lesser  nature,  puffed  up  with 
the  pride  of  self,  satisfied  with  its  little  victories, 
self -pityingly  nursing  its  little  defeats,  lays  hard 
hold  on  our  lives  and  struggles  persistently  for 
the  control.  The  whole  wretched  story  of  human 
unhappiness,  of  the  apparent  injustice  of  life's 
distribution  of  pain  and  pleasure,  of  wealth  and 
poverty,  of  exaltation  and  debasement,  would 
impel  us  to  keep  on  playing  the  losing  game. 
But  a  deeper  discernment  comes  to  the  honest 
seeker  of  the  true.  A  fairer,  deeper  study  of 
human  history  discloses  the  significant  fact  that 
life's  finest  work  has  been  done  by  those  whose 
hearts  have  bled,  those  who  have  trod  the  wine- 
press alone.  And  again  the  revealing  truth  is 
apparent,  that  poverty  and  wealth,  high  estate 
and  mediocrity,  pain,  loss  and  sin,  are  but  the 
pieces  on  life's  chess-board,  to  be  moved  by  the 
soul  to  victory  or  defeat. 

Harmony  in  Complexity. — The  din  of  human 
discord  is  unceasing.  A  superficial  view  of  human 
activities  shows  mankind  as  a  struggling,  striving, 
milling  mass,  in  confusion  from  vortex  to  periph- 
ery. From  this  throng,  ever  and  anon,  numbers 
are  seen  rushing  away,  that  they  may  find  peace. 
But  where  is  peace?  One  seeks  it  through  soli- 
tude on  the  calm  sea,  and  finds  there  but  a  passing 
tranquillity.  Another  betakes  him  to  the  mute 
seclusion  of  the  mountains,  and  comes  away  awed 
by  their  grandeur.  The  drear  wastes  of  the 


HARMONY  313 

desert  call  "Peace!"  to  another,  they  give  him 
back  but  desolation.  Upon  a  swaying  branch, 
beside  the  thunder  and  roar  of  the  cataract,  swing- 
ing precariously  close  to  instant  destruction  is  a 
nest,  a  mother  bird  and  her  little  ones,  and  from 
time  to  time  the  happy  father  contributes  to  the 
needs  of  his  family — and  peace  is  there.  Obli- 
vious to  the  swirling,  threatening  death,  these 
little  beings  have  performed  the  miracle  of  perfect 
adjustment,  and  live  fearless  and  happy  and  blest. 
Men  and  women  may  do  the  same. 

Life  is  complex  in  all  its  phases.  Internal  con- 
flicts are  numerous,  the  problems  of  the  inner  self 
are  truly  difficult  ones ;  but  with  a  simple,  whole- 
some, harmony- seeking  standard  of  life,  all  of  its 
complexities  may  be  simplified,  and  that  harassing, 
torturing  nervous  system,  the  enemy  of  the  neuro- 
tic, becomes  a  patient,  faithful  ally  to  the  master. 
But  discords  are  much  more  easily  produced  than 
harmonies.  Children  and  the  untutored  fingers  of 
maturity  and  age  strike  the  keys  of  the  piano,  and 
harsh,  strident  sounds  result.  Children,  and  men 
and  women,  young  and  aged,  often  touch  the  keys 
of  life's  contacts  with  equal  ignorance.  It  is  not 
only  our  lack  of  knowledge  which  we  allow  to 
destroy  life's  harmonies.  We  seem  ever  willing 
to  meet  the  evil  in  others  with  the  evil  in  our- 
selves, and  mankind's  quarrel  with  mankind  is 
Eden-old.  The  volumes  of  the  world  would  be 
inadequate  to  record  a  small  part  of  the  details 
of  man's  fight  against  his  fellowman,  yet  a  quarrel 
is  only  possible  when  evil  is  met  with  evil.  When 


314        THE  MASTERY  OF  NERVOUSNESS 

character  rises  supreme  to  mere  intellect  as  man- 
kind's directing  force,  man  will  fight  with,  instead 
of  against,  his  fellowman. 

Harmony  among  humankind  would  seem  to-day 
but  a  far-off  dream,  but  the  principle  of  efficiency 
through  harmony  is  an  all-saving  one,  ready  to 
lend  itself  as  a  creating  force  to  every  truth- 
seeking  individual.  All  real  adjustments  lead  to 
harmony  of  the  better  self  with  the  truths  that 
change  not.  Would  those  in  need  of  nervous  help 
but  turn  from  energy-destroying  strife,  and  lay 
hold  on  the  truth  that  life  is  eager  and  ready  to 
yield  happiness,  they  would  imbibe  a  vital  lesson 
in  that  optimistic  philosophy  which  is  an  absolute 
essential  to  the  nervous  stability  of  the  neurotic. 
The  individual  alone  is  responsible  for  what  he 
allows  to  dwell  in  his  heart.  The  soul  at  peace 
is  in  harmony  with  life.  The  healthy  soul  is 
self  kept  in  order.  Happiness,  so  yearned  for  by 
all,  though  sadly  deficient  in  the  lives  of  the  many, 
whose  very  sensitiveness  to  hurt  should  be  their 
strongest  incentive  to  strive  for  the  true  harmony 
of  existence,  cannot  be  forced  out  of  life  by  whin- 
ing resentments.  It  must  come  hand  in  hand  with 
joy  in  one's  work,  power  developed  through  the 
art  of  play,  and  the  peace  of  the  conscious  "Well 
done!" 

Inspiration  whispers  and  promises,  remorse 
threatens  and  shames.  Both  are  given  us  to  create 
motives  and  feelings  for  better  doing.  But  we 
know  ourselves  only  through  effort,  for  the 
product  of  effort  alone  assures  man  of  his  ability 
to  accomplish,  and  nowhere  except  in  such  ability 


HARMONY  315 

abides  that  true  confidence  in  self  which  is  the 
perfect  fruit  of  well-doing.  And  a  life  of  well- 
doing is  the  basis  of  nobility  of  soul,  for  life 
knows  no  success  comparable  to  that  truly  serene 
self,  gentle,  kindly,  merciful,  supremely  charitable 
— that  serene  self  which  holds  the  infinite  power 
of  repose  and  self-mastery — the  perfect  harmony 
of  the  simple  life.  Each  day  of  such  living  is 
a  day  of  victory,  a  day  of  uplift,  a  day  of  giving 
all  and  receiving  the  yet  more.  The  progress 
of  such  living  cannot  be  reckoned  in  years,  for  he 
who  has  attained  the  supreme  victory  through  the 
harmonising  of  his  whole  nature  with  those  mag- 
nificent forces  intrusted  to  his  keeping,  knows  no 
better  or  worse;  for  him  it  is  always  the  best. 
Triumphantly  he  may  finally  breathe  with  the 
poet: 

"So  be  my  passing, 

My  task  accomplished,  and  the  long  day  done. 
My  wages  taken  and  in  my  heart 
Some  late  lark  singing; 
Let  me  be  gathered  to  the  quiet  West, 
The  sundown,  splendid  and  serene." 


INDEX 


ABILITY,  discounted  by  mental 

habits,   102 
ACCUBACY,  acquiring,  183 

clearing  up  thought,  183 
ACHES,  numerous,   109 
ACIDITY  (see  Overacidity) 
ACTION,  born  in  will,  214 

final  expression  of  man,  215 

play  is  pleasurable,  113 

the  measure  of  worth,  215 

wasteful    versus    purposeful, 

18 
ACTIVITY,  at  forty,  69 

blessings  of,  62 

gymnasiums  for,  63 

man  created  for,  71 

necessary  for  brain,  67 

necessary  for  muscle,  67 

necessary  for  will,  70 

overactive,  17,  18 

productive,  62,  71,  305 

satisfaction  from,  62 
ADAPTABILITY,  of  man,  41 
ADJUSTMENTS,  capacity  for,  1 

channels  of,  142 
^competition  demands,  7 

complex,  6 

emotions  aiding,  143 

examples  of,  1 
^external,  309 

harmony  in,  309 

humanity's,  309 

imitation  aiding,  142 

in  animal  life,  273 

intellect's,  10 

intelligence  aiding,  143 

internal,    309 

lack  of,  309 

life's  crowning,  312 

life's  demand  for,  311 

man  and,  1 
S  man's  capacity  for,  9,  12 

mental,  9 


317 


Adjustments — Continued 

miracles  of,  10 

moral,  9,  10,  309 

normal,  310 

power  of,  9,  10 

problem  of,  278 

secret  of,  11 

self,  278 

through  will  mastery,  230 

to  climate,  9 

to  diet,  107 

to  governments,  10 

to  industry,  106,  107 

to  moral  life,  9,  10 

to  philosophies,  10 

to  religions,  10 

to  the  possible  self,  310,  311 

to  unselfishness,  11 
ADVERSITY,  challenge  of,  302 

hope  in,  291 
AGE,  of  flux,  2 

of  nervousness,   2 
AGGRESSIVENESS,  of  progress,  8 
ALCOHOL,   appeals  to  apparent 
need,  173 

a  temporary  stimulant,  174 

epilepsy  and,  30 

government  committee  report 
on,  29 

handicapped  by,  92 

heredity  of,  29,  30 

in  one  hundred  forms,  173 

life  shortened  by,  29 

nervous  damage  of,  29 

price   paid   by   neurotic   for, 
174 

robbing  of  ability,  30 

robbing  stability,  30,  174 

treacherous  influence  of,  173, 

174 

ALCOHOLISM,  241 
ALTRUISM,  as  perfected  egoism, 
305 


318 


INDEX 


AMBITION,  biddings  of,  11 

leadership  of,  296 
AMUSEMENT,  failure  of,  298 

wrecks  of,  298 

ANAEMIA,  from  food  poisoning, 
72 

through  overeating,  51 
ANIMALS,   adjustments  of,   273 

passivity  of,  273 

sentimentality        concerning, 
273 

stoicism  of,  273 
ANTIPATHY,  based  on  whims,  76 

to  food,  76 

to  milk,  76 
ANXIETY,  place  of,  275 
APOPLEXY,  51 

APPETITE,  a  creation  of  habit, 
74 

as  desire,  74,  76 

as  mentor,  74 

blessings  of,  75 

damage  of  unrestrained,  74, 
75 

demands  of,  74 

fatal,  75 

food  antipathies  of,  76 

food  associations  of,  75 

intensity  of,  75 

lasting  influence  of,  75 

normal,  92 

of  boys,  75 

perverted  by  disease,  75 

responds  to  cultivation,  96 

through  fatigue,  64 

unreasonable,  76 

whipped-up,  92 

ASSEBTTON   (see  Self -Assertion) 
ATTENTION,  active,  161 

and  selection,  178,  179 

and  self-control,  163 

channels  of,  127 

concentration  of,  127 

dormant,  128 

effect  on  body  of,  131,  136,  139 

harmful       overattention       in 
childhood,   139 

inattention         strengthening, 
181 

in  selection,  127-140 


Attention — Continued 

interest  through,  178,  179 

in  the  hypochondriac,  136 

in  the  nervous,  139 

invalidism  from,  140 

memory  the  product  of,  180 

necessary  to  children,  139 

pains  of,  139 

power  of,  127 

selection  of  material  for,  127 

self,  139,  140 

sustained,    ITS 

the  cure  of  self,  191,  192 

the  product  of  interest,  178, 

179 

to  body,  136 
to  the  irrelevant,  180 
to  vegetative  functions,  160 
weakness  from  over-,  140 
will  directing,  159 
will's  power,  178 
ATTITUDE,  and  sad  living,  246 
bound    by    discomforts,    105, 

106 

control  of,  203 
effects  of  unworthy,  241 
effects     of     wholesome,     203, 

204,  241 

in  defeat,  269,  270 
in  small  emergencies,  204 
making  galley  slaves,  246 
of  calm  displacing  intensity, 

107 

of  envy  toward  superiors,  104 
of  failure,  104 
of  false  pride,   107 
of  happiness,  102,  109,  111 
of  peace,  206 
of  rebellion,  246 
of  surrender,  105,  246 
of  surrender  in  the  neurotic, 

241 

proper  emotional,  104,  105 
selection  of,  290 
soul-shrivelling,   270 
spirit  determining,  290 
terror,  270 
transforming    loss    to    gain, 

271 
winning  serenity,  246 


INDEX 


319 


ATTITUDES,     defeat     attending, 

274 

defective,  274 

AUTHORITY,  disrespect  for,  35 
AUTOINTOXICATION,  72,  77 
AUTOMATIC,   when   action   may 

be,  187 


BASEBALL  (see  Sport) 
BATTLES,  for  happiness,  287 

for  the  useless,  287 

for  the  worthy,  287 

inevitable,  287 

of  adjustment,  287 

of  wants  versus  needs,  287 

self-interest  in  life's,  288 
BEAUTY,  and  goodness,  279,  280 

life's  unused,  311 

of  friendship,  311 

of  gentleness,  311 

of  patience,  311 

of  thoughtfulness,  311 
BLUES,  THE,  and  muscle,  67 
BODY,  adjustments  of,  9 

an  engine,  42 

frail,  308 

fuel  for,  42,  43 

using  carbon  and  oxygen,  42 

variety  of  food  used  by,  42 
BODY  FLUIDS,  death  from  acid- 
ity of,  53 

BONDSMEN,  of  emotions,  301 
BRAIN,  brawn  versus,  7 

insensible,  16 

ministers  of,  1 

overactive,  17 

overresponsive,  16 
BRAIN-WORKERS,  advantage  of, 
99 

avoiding  work,  100 

cruelty  of,  100 

discrediting  muscle,   100 

mastery  of,  99 

overreaching  self,  101 
BRAWN-WORKERS,    directed    by 
brains,  99 

hating  superiors,  100 

past  slavery  of,  99 
BUILDERS,  unseen,  300 


BURDENS,  as  excuses,  274 
as  weights,  272 
cluttering,  275 
destroying  serenity,  275 
inevitable,  272,  273 
of  impending  death,  273 
of  infirmities,  273 
of  losses,  273 
of  weaknesses,  273 
true,  272 
tug  of,  272 


CAMPING   (see  Sport) 
CANDY   (see  Sweets) 

a   highly    concentrated   food, 
83 

brain-workers  and,  83,  84 

chemical  reaction  of,  83 

children  and,  82,  83 

intestinal    indigestion    from, 
83 

muscle-workers  and,  83 

overindulgence  in,  83 
CAPACITY,     for     accomplishing, 
13 

for  adjustment,  1,  12 

for  enjoyment,   13 

for  reaction,  12 

for  suffering,  13 

man's,  1 

of  Shakespeare,  12 

of  the  dolt,  12 

CATASTROPHE,  transformed,  292 
CHARACTER,  achieved,  247 

and  reality,  18*5 

and  willing,  222 

a  victory,  240 

challenged  by  change,  265 

challenged  by  defeat,  265 

challenged  by  loss,  265 

challenged  by  pain,  265 

directing  intellect,  313,  314 

dislikes  influencing,  229 

effort  and,  240 

founded    on   the   moral    self, 
269 

found    through     catastrophe, 
292 

in  loneliness,  268 


320 


INDEX 


Character — Continued 

life's  contribution  to,  303 

nature  of  moral,  240 

nervous,  240 

not  innate,  240 

robbed  of,  242 

strengthened  by  will,  222 

strife  and,  240 

struggle  for,   240 

through  moral  nature,  248 

transmuting  feeling,  219 

weakened    by     idle    wishing, 

222 

CHARITY,  versus  dislikes,  302 
CHEER,  buoyancy  of,  298 
CHILD,  parents'  training  of,  31- 
38;    teachers'    training   of, 
38,  39 

training  of,  31-40 
CHOICE,  adjustments  of,  7 

attention  in,  244 

deliberate,  244 

infinite,  5 

instinctive,  244 

in  thought  life,  178,  179 

of  self-denial,  244 

of  self-sacrifice,  244 

of  the  mode  of  life,  310 

of  the  second  best,  298 

of  true  morality,  244 
CHRISTIAN    SCIENCE,    contribu- 
tion of,  311 
CIGARETTE,  as  a  panacea,  175 

constant  use  of,  174 

weakening  will,  174,  175 
CIVILISATION,  advance  of,  2 

effeminating,  2 

intricate,  2 

modern,  2 

CLEAR   THINKING    (see   Think- 
ing) 

COCAINE,  effects  of,  174 
COFFEE  (see  Diet,  Tea  Drugs) 

a  poison,  56 

caffeine  in,  56 

nervous  damage  of,  56 

not  a  true  food,  91 

stimulating  effect  of,  56 

topers  of,  56 
COLLEGES,  and  tension,  5 


COMFORT,  choosing,  310 

of  body,  310 

of  soul,  310 

worship  of,  295 
COMMON  SENSE,  Nature's  gift, 

128 
COMPETITION,  age  of,  7 

brawn  versus  brain  in,  7 

by-products  of,  7 

strife  of,  7 
COMPLEXITIES,  life's,  6 

of  crowded  living,  7 

of  high  living,  7 

of  life,  313 

of  life's  demands,  6 

of  the  nervous  victim,  295 

peace  in,  312,  313 

simplifying,  313 
CONCEIT,  in  childhood,  139 

pride  of,  298 

through  overattention,  139 
CONCESSIONS,  to  nerves,  3 

to  precautions,  3 
CONDEMNATION,  habit  of,  255 

in  chronic  kickers,  255 
CONDUCT,    and    moral    adjust- 
ment, 232 

defects  of,  36 

good  habits  of,  34 

individualistic,  232 

man's  attitude  in,  236 

multiplied  standards  of,  35 

philosophy  governing,  10 

possibilities  of,  232 

religion  governing,   10 

self-help  in,   36 

varying    standards    of,    233- 

235 
CONFLICT,   confusing,  273 

of  man  with  man,  313 

spiritual,  273 
CONSCIENCE,  ambition  and,  278 

a  medium,   278 

an  interpreter  of  truth,  280 

"better    than    thou"   attitude 
of,  279 

conventional,  279 

defective,  279 

disturbances  of,  278 

ignoring,  28"2 


INDEX 


321 


Conscience — Continued 

investigation  of,  279 

materialism  and,  278 

of  utilitarian  morality,  279 

reason  and,  278 

selfish,  279 

the  esthetic,  279 

the  heart  of  the  moral  na- 
ture, 277 

the  morbid,  280,  281 

the  organ  of  the  soul,  278 
CONSCIENTIOUSNESS,        morbid, 

38 

CONSCIOUSNESS,  demanding  an 
object,  179 

intellect  must  protect,  179 

wish  and  desire  in,  179 
CONTACT,  reading  versus,  301 

value  of,  301 

with  people,  301 
CONTENTIONS,  of  ignorance,  257 

rebellious,  257 
CONTROL  (see  Self -Control) 

by  change  of  attention,  212, 
213 

by    discounting    discomforts, 
211 

by  forbidding  expression,  210 

for  temperance,  298 

in  little  ills,  211 

mood,  210 

of  emotional  weather,  206 

secret  of,  212 

teaching  the  child,  212 

through  attitude,  203,  204 
COOKING    (see    Ignorant    Cook- 
ing) 

COOPERATION,    and    individual- 
ity, 293 

miracles  of,  293 

DECISION,  indecision  leading  to, 

224 
DEFEAT,  and  drugs,  299,  300 

and  failure,  296 

and  shrewdness,  299,  300 

by  things,  299,  300 

despair  of,  296 

facing,  308 

faith  through,  308 


Defeat — Continued 

interest  of,  303 

pessimism  in,  296 

reasons  for,  299,  300 

versus  soul  force,  299 
DEFECTIVE  THINKING,  and  nerv- 
ous suffering,  129 
DENIAL   (see  Self-Denial) 

mastery  through,  81 
DEPRESSION,     and     autosugges- 
tion, 21 

attitude  toward,  290,  291 

combating,   291 

emotional,  195 

fight  of,  209 

from  autointoxication,  195 

from  crooked  thoughts,   199, 
200 

from  physical  toxins,  195 

in  acute  melancholia,  195 

indulgence  in,  209 

joy  in,  209 

"sprees"  of,  187 

temptation  of,  203 

versus  confidence,  204 

versus  courage,  204 
DESIRE,  a  force,  287 

and  strife,  284 

as  craze  for  possession,  284 

demoralizing,  284,  285 

effects  of,  284 

for  fame,  285 

frenzy  of,  284 

greedy,  284 

opposed  to  resolution,  159 

persistence  of,   167 

resentful  of  duty,  287 

selection  displacing,  180 

selfish,  287 

selfishness  of,  283,  284 

the  urge  of,  284 

wilful,   288 
DESIRES,  purpose  of,  304 

selfish,  304 

smothered,  298 
DESPAIR,  accepting  failure,  256 

and  toxins,  269 

a  weak  reaction,  266,  269 

causes  of,  266-270 

fatalistic,  260 


322 


INDEX 


Despair — Continued 

half-power  lives  of,  266 

means  defeat,  296 

pessimistic,  296 

spiritual  loss  in,  270 

surrender  of,  266 

terror  directing,  270 

through    craving   the   unpos- 
sessed, 266 

through  wishing  versus  will- 
ing, 266 

wretchedness  of,  270 
DIET,  adjustment  to,  107 

balancing  of  exercise  and,  98 

bran  in,  91 

excess  in,  94,  95 

for  babies,  95 

for  brain-workers,  94,  95 

milk  as,  95 

need  of  insoluble  material  in, 
90,  91 

proper  use  of  fats  in,  88,  89 

proteids     for     the     growing 
child,  in,  86 

proteids  in,  86,  87 

raw  eggs  as,  96 

reeducation  through,  95 

regularity  in,  99 

restriction  of  condiments  in, 
92,  93 

restriction  of  salt  in,  92,  93 

rich  foods  in,  93,  94 

simplest   proteids   for   brain- 
workers,  87,  88 

sweets  in,  84,  85 

three  hearty  meals  as  neces- 
sity in,  94,  95 

unwise  use  of  fats  in,  88,  89 

use  of  drugs  in,  91,  92 

use  of  water  in,  93 
DIFFICULTIES,  noting,  296 

of  every  day,  296 

of  the  upward  pull,  296 

place  of,  293 

DIGESTION,  damaged  by  unwise 
food,  87,  88 

fermentation  in,  97 

force  required  for  fat,  88 

insoluble  foods,  aid,  90,  91 

mastication  an  aid  to,  96,  97 


Digestion — Continued 

putrefaction  in,  97 

simple  foods  aid,  88 
DIRECTORSHIP    (see   Moral   Di- 
rectorship ) 
DISAGREEMENTS,  academic,  257 

becoming  discords,  257 

in  the  common,  257 

in  the  unworthy,  257 

of  fair  competition,  257 

of  vulgarity,  257 

stimulating,  257 
DISASTERS,    character   through, 
301,  302 

great,  301 

nervous,  1 

small,  301 
DISCERNMENT,  deeper,  312 

of  the  honest  seeker,  312 
DISCIPLINE,     for     nervousness, 
220,  221 

from  without,  225 

self-,  220,  221 
DISCOMFORTS,  assimilating,  219 

avoiding,  169 

bound  by,  105 

discounted  by,   105 

intolerance  of,  169 
DISCORD,  din  of,  312 

easily  produced,  313 

escape  from,  312 

of  man's  quarrels,  313 

when  evil  meets  evil,  313 
DISCREPANCY,  accepting,  310 

depression  the  result  of,  310 

ignoring,  310 

in  self,  310 
DISEASE,  drugs  for,  4 

electricity  for,  4 

functional,  15 

hydrotherapy  for,  4 

organic,  15 

the  mind  accepting,  141 
DISEASES,  functional,  4 

suggestion  in,  4 

treatment  of,  4,  5 
DISSATISFACTION,      cultivating, 

255 

DISTRIBUTION,    apparent   injus- 
tice of,  312 


INDEX 


Distribution — Continued 
of  pain,  312 

of  pleasure,  312 

of  poverty,  312 

of  wealth,  312 

DOING,  clear  thinking  and,  187 
DOUBT,  and  the  doubting  folly, 
167,  168 

questioning      decision,      167, 
168 

robbing  faith,  168 

suggesting  hopelessness,   168 

the  basis  of  restlessness,  168 

the  vacillations  of,  168 
DBEAMS,  day-,  137 

night-,  137 

un thought  cravings  in,  137 

wish  element  in  day-,  137 

wish  element  in  night-,  137 
DRUDGERY,  65 

place  of,  107,  111 

the  sense  of,  102 
DRUG,  alcohol  as  a,  173,  174 

cigarette  as  a,  174,  175 

cocaine  as  a,  174 

coffee  as  a,  173 

tobacco  as  a,  174,  175 
DRUGS,  as  emergency  measure, 
230 

character  displaced  by,  175 

for  sleep,  74 

handicaps  of,  91,  92 

in  sleeplessness,  230 

nervous  dependent  upon,  92 

nervous   sufferer   and,   74 

of  coffee,  91,  92 

of  tea,  91,  92 

of  tobacco,  91,  92 

temporizing,  230 

will  displaced  by,  175 
DRUG-USERS,     oversensitiveness 

of,  19,  20 
DUTIES,  divinely  appointed,  111 

energy    in    performance    of, 
104,  105 

enthusiasm  in  regard  to,  104, 
105 

life's,  104,  105 

small,  70 

versus  ideals,  70 


DYSPEPTICS,  and  sour  stomachs, 

78,  79 

belching  of,  78 
from  excess  of  sweets,  79 
harmful  self -attention  of,  78, 

79 

nervous,  78 
telephoning  to  stomach,  78 


EASE,  hindering  health,  67 
love  of,  67 

EATING,  and  efficiency,  196 
and  emotions,  196 

EATING      ERRORS,      abdominal 

pains  from,  72 
acute  damage  of,  72 
acute  indigestion  from,  72 
anaemia  from,  72 
autointoxication  from,  72 
aversion  to  food  from,  50 
catarrhal  conditions  from,  51 
chronic   food-poisoning  from, 

72 
chronic    self-poisoning    from, 

50 

dulness  from,  72 
fears  of,  50 
indigestion  from,  50 
inertia  from,  72 
insidious  damage  of,  72 
malnutrition  from,  72 
mental  damage  from,  72 
nausea  from,  72 
neuralgias  from,  72 
physical  damage  of,  72 
sick  headache  from,  72 
skin  diseases  from,  50 

EDUCATION,  and  selection,   128 
burden  of,  39,  40 
demands  of,  5 
glittering  generalities  in,  40 
insanity  as  a  result  of,  40 
intensity  in,  40 
in  women's  colleges,  40 
neurotics     as     a     result    of, 

40 
no    insurance    of    perfection, 

128 
of  inadequate  minds,  40 


324 


INDEX 


Education — Continued 

of  the  critical  sense,  128 

of  work,  108 

reason  neglected  in,  40 

the  purpose  of,  128 
EFFICIENCY,  augmented  by  ex- 
ercise, 108 

chemical  basis  of,  73 

conscience  and,  303 

contributions  toward,  301 

discounted     by     discomforts, 
105 

eating  for,   196 

enemies  of,  299 

of  mind,  303 

of  soul,  303 

requisites  of,  299 

right  doing  and,  301 

right  feeling  and,  301 

right  thinking  and,  301 

robbed  by  eating,  72 

secret  of,  303 

subconscious  aiding,  300 

training  for,  299-303 
EFFOBT,    and    body    hardening, 
219 

assurance  through,  314 

concentrated,  221 

confidence  through,  315 

decision  of,  222 

enlarging,  228 

hopeless  in  indecision,  223 

in  avoiding  results,  218 

in  resistance,  226 

in   the    morning    start,    220, 
221 

mechanical,   218 

mental    workers     neglecting, 
218 

necessary  for  character,  240 

need  of,  218 

of  defence,  226 

of  offence,  226 

self  found  through,  314 

strengthening  nerves,  219 
EGO,  basis  of  the  true,  286 
ELECTRICITY,   as  treatment  for 
disease,  4 

suggestive  power  of,  4 

value  of,  4 


EMOTIONS,  accompanying  ac- 
tion, 147 

accompanying  thought,  143, 
144 

and  dislikes,  153 

and  fatigue,  22 

and  moods,  209,  210 

and  sprees  of  temper,  153 

and  the  joy  sense,  203 

and  unsocial  tendencies,  153 

antagonistic  habits  through, 
153 

antagonists  of  will,  211 

appeal  of  the,  163 

attention  under  influence  of, 
163 

attractive  power  of,  143 

battle  between  volition  and, 
165 

beautifying,  200 

blight  of,  200,  201 

bondsmen  of,  201 

called  "feelings,"  144 

causing  nervous  suffering, 
149,  151 

crowding  the  mind,  198 

cultivating  the,  203,  204 

damage  of,  152,  153 

defeated  by  reason  and  will, 
163 

destructiveness  of,   152,  153 

displaced  by  will  effort,  202, 
212 

dominating  thought  selec- 
tion, 163 

expressed  in  "blue-black" 
moods,  151 

extravagance  of,  199 

fostered  by  parents,  202 

furore  of,  187 

harmful,  148,  149 

helpful,   148,   149 

in   animal   life,    143 

in  childhood,  202 

in  health,  196 

in  psychasthenia  (see  Psy- 
chasthenia ) 

instability  from  the,   152 

intellect  superseding  the, 
143 


INDEX 


325 


Emotions — Continued 

intense  in  the  nervous,   143, 

197 

intoxicated  with,  186,  187 
intoxication  of,  7 
lives  of  impulse  through  the, 

151 

mastering  reason,  151 
mastery  of  the,   158 
moulded  by  training,  202 
newspapers  and,  6 
of  anger,   143 
of  curiosity,  143 
of  depression,  187 
of  excitability,  187 
of  fatigue,  166 
of   fear,    143-145,    149,    153- 

157,  166,  167 
of  hate,  153 
of  impatience,   153 
of  irritability,  153 
of  primitive  anger,  152 
of   sullenness,    152,    153 
of  the  nervous,  162,  163 
outweighing  reason,  20 
physical   accompaniments   of, 

144,  145,  147-149,  187 
pleasant,  143 
possibilities  of,  212 
power  of  faith,  208 
power  over  body  of,  147-149 
power  over  mind  of,  149-152 
priority  of,  142,  143,  197 
producing    the    lighting    ef- 
fects, 150 

quicksands  of,  151 
refusing  expression  to,  205 
relation  of  intellect  to,  150 
relation  of  will  to,  150 
relief  through,  153 
remodelled  by  will,  210 
remodelled     through     whole- 
some living,  211 
repelling  power  of,  143 
root  idea  of,  21 
saving  leakage  in,  199 
spendthrifts  of,   187 
"sprees"  of,  186,  187 
suggestive  power  of,  198 
supremacy  of,  152 


surrender  to,  162,  163 

the  neurotic  and,  143 

tonic  of,  201 

"topers"  of,  201 

ugly,  235 

undermining  stability,  199 

unpleasant,  143 

utilising,  187 

versus  conduct,  205,  206 

versus  self-control,    163 
ENDURANCE,  enlarging  the  lim- 
its of,  162,  163 

finding  strength  in  will,  162 

Gladstone's,  162,  163 

limits  of,  261 

of  the  neurotic,  162 

of  the  "unbearable,"  162 

rare  powers  of,  261 

superior  to  suffering,  162 
ENERGY,  NERVOUS  (see  The 

Nervous ) 
ENJOYMENT,   capacity  for,   274 

esthetic,  280 
ENMITY,  strangled,  298 

versus  generosity,  298 

versus  love,  298 
ERROR,  accepting,  184 

delusions  and,  184,  185 

displaced  by  truth,  184 

relentless  pursuit  of,  185 

revealing  truths,  185 

surrender  to,  184 

through  false  pride,  184 

through  indolence,   184 

through  narrowness,  184 
EVIL,  consciousness  of,  282 
EXCESS,  and  health,  67 

emotional,  64 

toxic,  64 
EXERCISE,  amount  of,  120 

and  food,   67 

as  cure  for  sleep,  230 

balance  of  food  and,  50 

breathing,   117 

camping  as,   116,  120 

constructive,   117,   118 

efficiency  and,  108 

essential  to  life,  59 

extending  fatigue  limit,  120 

gardening  as,  120 


326 


INDEX 


Exercise — Continued 

gradual  development  by,  117, 
118 

hand- wrestling  as,  119 

hill-climbing  as,    115 

in  work,  59 

medicine-ball  as,  118 

moral  courage  in,  119 

of  primitive  man,  59 

overprotection  and,  109 

walking  as,  115 

wood-chopping  as,  120 
EXHAUSTION,  from  subacidosis, 

54 

EXISTENCE,  query  of,  309 
EXPEBIENCES,   and   actual   self, 
310 

and  possible  self,  310 

of  life- time,  310 

self -moulding,  310 
EXTRAVAGANCE,  in  speech,  186 

means     inaccurate     thought, 
186 

nervous  results  of,  186 


FACTS,    determined    by    self-in- 
terests, 184,  185 

opinion  versus,  185,  186 
FAILUEE,    burdens    as    excuses 
for,  274 

intellect  choosing,  297,  298 

lessons  of,  256 

not  final,  256 

of  mechanical  living,  296 

of  short-sightedness,  295 

of  the  pleasure-seeker,  298 

pessimism  and,  296 

the  why  of,  303,  304 

to  find  peace,  295 

universal,  256 

versus  self-control,  304 

versus  self-respect,  304 

victims  of,  295,  296 

when  foreordained,  297 
FAITH,  and  soul  sickness,  289, 
290 

curative,  289 

displacing  fear,  207,  208 

essential  to  peace,  289 


Faith—  Continued 
quality  of,  289 
replacing  despair,  270 

FATALISM,  irreligious,  269,  270 

FATIGABILITY,   analysis  of,   22, 

23 

an  energy  disorder,  23 
how  produced,  22 
mental,  22 
muscular,  22 
of  the  neurasthenic,  22,  23 

FATIGUE,  accepted  by  indolence, 

166 

moral,  64 
normal,  64 
surrender  to,  166 
through  indolence,  102 
wholesome,  63 

FATS,  acid-producing  in  excess, 

53 

butter,  89 
cream,  89 

fermentation  from,  89 
flesh  gained  from,  89,  98 
heat  and  energy  from,  88 
indigestion  from,  88,  89 
learning  to  digest,  88,  89 
nervousness  from,  89 
overindulgence  in,  89,  98 
unwise  mixtures  with,  88,  89 
wholesome,  89 

FEAR,  and  circulation,  144 
and  reason,  167 
and  the  eye  muscles,  144 
and  the  gland  secretions,  144 
and  the  nervous,  207 
an  impelling  force,  207 
a  prisoner  to  courage,  208 
effect  on  body  of,   144,   145, 

149 

facing,  229 
faith  robbing,  208 
frenzied  action  of,  152,  154 
general  physical  reactions  to, 

144 

imperfect  adjustments  of,  153 
influencing  involuntary  mus- 
cles, 144 
influencing  vital  organs,  144 


INDEX 


327 


Fear — Continued 
influencing  voluntary  mus- 
cles, 144,  145 
insidious    manifestations    of, 

154 

love  robbing,  208 
of  insanity,  208 
of  the  indefinite,  207 
paralysing,  154 
surrender  to,  154,  229 
terrors  of,  207 
urging  to  crude  force,  154 
FEAR-MORALITY   (see  Morality) 
FEARS,  acquired,  37 

dispelling  vagueness,  37 
harmful,  37 
necessary,  37 
overcoming,  37 
producing  antipathy,  37 
producing  imaginary  horrors, 

37 

substituting  love  for,  37 
FEELING,  and  thought,  195 
and  will,  205,  210 
associated  with  action,  195 
as  suds  versus  substance,  199 
day-dreams  and,  222 
distorting  decision,  1981 
effect  on  will  of,  201 
inaccurate,  222 
intuitive,  198 
of  fear  of  pain,  210 
power  of,  195 
right,  200 
slavery  to,  201,  219 
suggesting  reason,  198 
surrender  to,  210 
FEELINGS,  disregard  for  bodily, 

310,  311 

influence  of,  267 
rebellious,  267 
self-pitying,  267 
unworthy,  267 
FOOD,  abominations  of,  76 
a  chemical  influence,  53 
acid-forming,  53 
alcohol  as,  29,  33 
alkaline-forming,  53 
and  sleep,  230 
carbohydrate,  44 


Food — Continued 
diversity  of,  42 
greasy,  33 
hydrocarbon,  44 
inorganic,  44 
intemperance  in,  28,  29 
luxuries  of,  43,  44 
meats  as,  53 
rich,  32,  33 

self-poisoning  from,  230 
sweets  as,  32,  33,  53 
FOOD  ERRORS,  anaemia  from,  51 
apoplexy  from,  51 
biliousness  from,  51 
Bright's  disease  from,  52 
emaciation  from,  51 
nervousness  from,  52 
paralysis  from,  52 
premature  old  age  from,  51 
FOOD-EXERCISE    KEADJTTSTMENT, 

230 
FOOD    INTEMPERANCE,     causing 

self-poisoning,  29 
exercise  and,  29 
in  use  of  fats,  29 
in  use  of  meats,  29 
in  use  of  sweets,  29 
FOOD-POISONING,  chronic,  72 
effect  on  involuntary  muscles 

of,  146 
emotional     depression    from, 

146 

the  "blues"  from,  146 
FOOD    PREPARATION,    abomina- 
tions in,  57 

damage  of  greases  in,  57 

excess  of  condiments  in,  5  / 

excess  of  sugar  in,  57 

overcooking  in,  57 
FORCE,  blessings  of  restrained, 
252 

destruction    by    misdirected, 
252 

essential  to  life,  250 

in  action,  250 

in  death,  250 

in  life,  250 

in  the  electric  dynamo,  250 

in  the  steam  engine,  250 


328 


INDEX 


Force — Continued 

in  words,  251 

man  utilising,  250 

mental  versus  physical,  250 

Nature's,  250 

of  Niagara,  250 

of  self-assertion,  251 

the  mob's  destructive,  252 
FORETHOUGHT,  scientific,  193 

the  accomplishments  of,  193 
FBEEDOM,    disciplined    through, 
288 

of  man,  307 

righteous,  288 

FUNCTIONAL   DISEASE,   electric- 
ity for,  4 

hydrotherapy  for,  4 

medicine  in,  4 

treatment  of,  4 

GENEROSITY,  desires  and,  304 

false,  304,  305 

GENTLENESS,  greatness  of,  308 
GIRLS,  health  of,  68 

play-habit  in,  69 
GIVING,  life  rich  in,  298 

willingness  in,  298" 
GROUCH,  acute,  255 

chronic,  255 

HABIT,  appetite  a  creation  of, 
74 

enlisting,  192 

not  simply  automatic,  192 

of  active  willing,  161 

spasms,  18  (see  Restlessness) 

the  automatic,  12 
HABITS,  formed  by  will,  216 

inculcated  in  babyhood,  31 

of  deliberate  choice,  216 

through  association,  38 
HAPPINESS,  and  joy,  314 

and  peace,  314 

and  play,  314 

associated  with  effort,  102 

deficient,  314 

not  forced,  314 

sensitiveness  hurting,  314 

through  the  daily  task,  111 


HARMONY,  adjustments  leading 
to,  314 

at  the  edge  of  the  cataract, 
313 

destroying,  313 

efficiency  through,  313 

in  complexity,  312 

of  man  with  man,  313,  314 

of    self    with    eternal    truth, 
314 

of  the  whole  man,  309 

victory  through,  315 
HEADACHES,  sick,  72 
HEALTH,  a  mental  state,  15 

and  emotional  comfort,  196 

and  happiness,  196 

and  overused  brains,  67 

and  the  muscles,  109 

and  underused  bodies,  67 

buoyancy  of,  109 

cheap  pride  and,  67 

damaged  by  underwork,  211 

emotions  affecting,  210 

enemies  of,  67 

excess  and,  67 

exercise  and,  67 

food  and,  67 

food  and  exercise  controlling, 
47,  48,  50 

girls  robbed  of,  68 

ignorance  and,  67 

indolence  and,  67 

muscles'  contribution  to,  67 

nervous,  15 

of  the  average  person,  109 

overprotection  and,  108 

pride  in  effort  of,  108 

propriety  versus,  68 

rational  living  and,  109 

sedentary  lives  and,  109 

sentimental!  sm  and,  67 

simple  laws  of,  172 

under-development    and    109, 
110 

versus  aches,  109 

versus  complaints,  109 
HEAT,  from  the  muscles,  67 
HEREDITY,  acquired  weaknesses 
of,  27 

independence  through,  27 


INDEX 


329 


Heredity — Continued 

inferior    through    eating    er- 
rors, 56 
of  intemperance,  28 

HILL-CLIMBING    (see  Exercise) 

HOME  TRAINING,  defects  intensi- 
fied by,  31 
discipline  in,  31,  32 
evolving  the  child  tyrant,  32 
habits  established  by,  32 
lack  of  order  in,  31 
needs  of  the  child  in,  31 
overstimulating  the  child,  32 
quietude  and  simplicity  in,  31 
system  in,  31,  32 

HOPELESSNESS,  296 

HUNTING  (see  Sport) 

HUXLEY,  on  good  men,  238 

HYDROTHEBAPY,    limited    value 

of,  4 
use  of,  4 

HYPERSENSITIVE  TYPE  (see  Sen- 
sitiveness) 

HYPOCHONDRIACAL    TYPE     ( see 
Self -Attention) 

HYPOCHONDRIASIS,  241 
results  of,  136 

HYSTERIA,  241 

imitative  power  of,  21 
suggestibility  the  basis  of,  21 
symptoms  of,  21 

IDEALISM,    expressed    in    work, 
121 

IDEALISTIC  MORALITY  (see  Mor- 
ality) 

IDEAS,  great,  70 
of  a  dull  brain,  12 
versus  small  duties,  70 

IDEATION,  giving  the  future,  126 
in  imagination,  126 

IDLENESS,  content  of,  101,  102 
fatigue  of,  101,  102 
horror  of,  305 
intellect  and,  102 
not  happiness,  101,  102 
shifting  responsibility,  101 

IGNORANCE,   explaining  failure, 

214 
hindering  health,  67 


IGNORANT    COOKING,    57     (see 

Food  Preparation) 
ILLNESS,  moral  element  in,  241, 

242 

nervous,  241-243 
surrender  to,  242 
ILLS,  begetting,  173 

discussing  our,  172,  173 
keeping  to  ourselves  our,  173 
whining  about,  173 
IMAGINATION,  and  day-dreams, 

136 

beautifying,   126 
hysterical,  138 
inaccurate  knowledge  and, 

136 

longings  of,  137 
morbid,   137 
resulting    in    sentimentalism, 

137 

supplanting  reality,  137,  138 
unwholesome  habits  of,  136 
IMITATION,  blind,  142 
intelligent,  142 
setting  standards,  142 
the  average  channel  of  adjust- 
ment, 142 
IMPULSE,  animal,  10 

power  of,  10 

IMPULSIONS,  compelling,   18 
INACTIVITY,  damage  of,  61,  66, 

68,  70 

penalty  of,  66,  71 
poisons  of,  65,  66 
pride  of,  70 

INATTENTION,  strengthening  at- 
tention, 181 
INCENTIVE,    inspiration    as    an, 

314 

remorse  as,  314 
to  harmony,  314 
INCIDENTALS,  rising  above,  105 
INCOMPETENCE,  the  sense  of,  102 
INDECISION,    and    nervous    ten- 
sion, 224 

between    aggression    and    in- 
hibition, 166,  167 
clearing    the    mind    of,    223, 

224 
conflicts  of,  166-1681 


330 


INDEX 


Indecision — Continued 
cure  for,  224 
doubts  of,  167,  168 
effort  of,  224 

from  multiplied  interests,  224 
from  thin  attention,  224 
hoplessness  of,  224 
restlessness  of,  224 
smudge  of,  223 
toxins  causing,  222 
versus  decision,  224 
weakening  determination,  159 
weakening  will,   166 
INDIGESTION,    air-swallowing 

and,  78,  97 
as  defective  digestive  force, 

77 

as  oversensitiveness,  77 
autointoxication  and,  77 
effect  on  organs  of,  92 
food-gulping  and,  97 
from  damaging  food  residue, 

89,  90 

from  elaborate  menus,  89 
from  excess  of  fats,  89 
from  food  mixtures,  88",  89 
nervous,  77-79 
overacidity  of,  79 
overeating  and,  97 
precautions  against,  96,  97 
wrong  attention  and,  79,  80 
INDIVIDUALITY,  surrender  of,  11 
INDOLENCE,  an  enemy  of 

strength,  101 
a  poison-breeder,  101 
aristocracy  of,  63 
avoiding  responsibility,   101 
bred  by  ability,  101 
bred  by  energy,  101 
bred  by  genius,  101 
bred  by  mastery,  101 
bred  by  skill,  101 
bred  by  success,  101 
bred  by  wit,  101 
destroying  character,  101 
hindering  health,  67 
hindering  play,  102 
inaccurate  thinking  in,  102 
inertia  of,  70 
making  neurotics,  214 


Indolence — Continued 

mental,  102 

penalty  of,  63 

pride  of,  63 

producing  fatigue,  101 

self -deceived,  70 

sham  work  of,  102 

the  incubator  of  disease,  101 

undersized  bodies  of,  67,  68 

weariness  of,  63,  64 

withering  touch  of,  102 
INDULGENCE      ( see     Self  -Indul- 
gence) 

cured    by    outside   discipline, 
225, 

in  drink,  225 

in  drugs,  225 

when  permissible,  228 
INDUSTRY,  adjustment  to,   107, 
108 

grind  of,  253 

resentment  against,  253,  254 
INFIRMITIES,  inherited,  273 
INFLUENCES,  reactions  to,  11 
INSOMNIA  ( see  Sleep  and  Sleep- 
lessness) 
INSPIRATION,  ignoring  the  call 

of,  296 
INSTINCT,  aggressive,  142 

aiding  adjustment,  142 

and  emotional  life,  142 

opposed  to  reason,  159 

primitive,  142 

productive,  142 

protective,  142 
INSTINCTS,  racial,  278 

versus  conscience,  278 
INTELLECT,  adjustments  of,  10 

and    crooked    thoughts,    199, 
200 

attention  and,  159 

clear  thinking  of,  199 

conjurings  of  man's,  308" 

demands  on,  5 

dependent  upon  nervous  sys- 
tem, 72 

displacing  emotions,  197,  199 

forced,  5,  6 

forming  habits  of  calculation, 
198 


INDEX 


331 


Intellect — Continued 

helpless  without  will,  159 

immoral,  236 

of  children,  5 

perverted,  199,  200 

possibilities  of,  10 

revelations  of,  9,  10 

selective  power  of,  159 

toxicity  hurting,  222 

unmoral,  236 

versus      emotional      leakage, 
199 

versus  morality,  236 

work  of  the,  164 
INTELLIGENCE,     aiding     adjust- 
ment, 142 

and  nervous  cure,  177 

clear  thinking  and,  177 

constructive    organisers    and, 
142 

leaders  of  progress  and,   142 

of  the  judicial  mind,  142 
INTEMPERANCE,  alcohol,  29,  30, 

blighted  lives  of,  28 

food,  28,  29 

innocent  victims  of,  28 

nervous  system  affected  by,  28 

tobacco,  30 
INTENSITY,  and  simplicity,  6 

chronic,  6 

devitalising,  6 

emotions  in,  6 

expressing  worry,  275 

in  education,  6 

of  modern  living,  6,  7 

over-,  15 

substituting  calm  for,  107 
INTERESTS,  higher,  164 

influence  of  will  on,  164 

multiplying,  302 
INTOXICATION    (see  Self -Intoxi- 
cation) 

emotional,  7 

INTROSPECTION,  disease  of,  139, 
140 

"shut-in"  nature  of,  139 
INVALIDISM,  unworthy,  158 

worthy,  158 
IRRITABILITY,  displacing,  206 

freedom  from,  206,  207 


Irritability — Continued 

mastered  by,  206 

of  worry,  275,  276 
IRRITATIONS,  subject  to,  105 

JOY,  felt  by  the  few,  254 

inner  source  of,  243 

in  the  joyous  life,  243 

in  work,  254 

rebellion  perverting,  254 

through  misfortune,  255 
JUDGMENT,  memory  serves,  126 

right  basis  of,  197 

superficial,  7 

the  result  of  reason,  126 

will  serves,  126 
JUSTICE,  questions  of,  288 

KNOWLEDGE,  superficial,  131 

LAWS,  ignored,  1 

of  man's  being,  1 
LAWS  OF  EATING,  determined  by 
occupation,  73,  74,  80 

for  football  player,  74 

for  harvest  hand,  74 

for  loggers  in  camp,  74 

for  sedentary  lives,  75 

reason  to  decide,  73 
LEADERSHIP,  spiritual,  312 
LIBERTY,  surrender  of,  11 
LICENSE,  versus  restraint,  288 
LIFE,  audit  of  book  of,  310 

chaotic,  309 

complex,  309,  313 

conflicts  of,  313 

moral,  309 

purpose  of,  308 
LIMITATIONS,     an    opportunity 

for  growth,  267 
LIVING,  art  of,  285 

false  modes  of,  284,  285 
LONELINESS,    and    morbid    de- 
spair, 268 

and  the  inner  self,  268 

a  test  of  self,  267.,  268 

making  the  best  of,  268 

making  the  worst  of,  268 
Loss,  apparent,  261 

calamity  of,  270 

in  childhood,  259 


332 


INDEX 


Loss — Continued 

inevitable,  260,  271 

meaning  of,  260 

of  appreciation,  260 

of  faith,  273 

of  friends,  273 

of  hope,  273 

of  ideals,  259 

of  loved  ones,  273 

of  property,  273 

of  reputation,  273 

of  trust,  259 

spiritual,  270 

surrender  to,  261 

transformed    to    gain,    260- 

262,  271 
LOWER  NATURE,  struggling  for 

control,  312 
LUXURIES,  in  food,  43 

MALICE,  as  grouch,  265 

causing  strife,  256 
MAN,  accomplishments  of,  307, 
308 

activities  of,  307 

a  free  agent,  41 

an  artist's  manikin,  307 

and  Nature,  308 

essentially  nervous,  1 

mental  needs  of,  42 

moral  needs  of,  42 

physical  needs  of,  42 

supremacy  of,  307 

unity  of,  42 

MANHOOD,  developing,  306 
MASTER-MAN,  THE,  at  play,  121, 

122 
MASTERY,  attitude  of,  302 

battle  of,  258 

failure  in,  1 

goal  of  self-,  122 

making   play    of   work,    121, 
122 

man's,  1 

moral  guidance  essential  to, 
258 

of  defeat,  302 

through    playing    the    game, 
122 

will  holds  secret  of,  162,  163 


MATURITY,  forgetting  play,  113 

losses  of,  259,  260 
MEAT,  acid-producing,  53 
MEAT-EATING,     arguments    for 
and  against,  86,  87 

brain-workers  and,  87,  88 

damaging  in  older  men,  87,  88 

determined  by  occupation,  87, 
88 

drugging  the  system,  87 

frontiersmen  and,  87 

nerve  damage  from,  SS 

when  beneficial,  86 

when  earned,  87 

when  toxin-producing,  87 
MEDICINE,  accuracies  of,  239 

and  the  metaphysical,  239 

effect  on  mind  of,  4 

material  problems  of,  239 

science  in,  239 

MELANCHOLIA,  from  autointoxi- 
cation, 195 

MEMORY,  and  the  art  of  forget- 
ting, 180 

cause  of  poor,  180 

reproducing  sensation,  125 

reproducing  the  past,  125 

waste-basket  and,  180 
MENDELIAN  LAW,  27 
MENTAL  HABITS,  as  a  cause  of 
failure,  102 

discounting  ability,  102 
MILK,  antipathy  to,  76 

curdling  in  digestion,  80 

health  and,  77 

the  simplest  food,  76,  77 

Vichy  in,  77 
MIND,  accepting  reality,  125 

and  health,  141 

and  its  adjustments,  10 

and   the  telephone  exchange, 
127 

a  superb  instrument,  124 

capacity  of,  124 

concentration  of,  128 

curiosity  of,  9 

damaging  habits  of,   129-131 

defective  thinking  of  the,  129, 
130 

developing  the  automatic,  139 


INDEX 


333 


Mind — Continued 

dormant  attention  of,  128 

errors  of,  138 

externalising  its  interests, 
139 

impulse  mastering,  130 

in  individual  perception,  125 

in  the  sciences,  9,  10 

investigations  by,  9 

lacking  poise,  128,  135 

reaching  beyond  self,  139 

self-centred,  139,  140 

senses  the  limit  of,  125 

subconscious,  12 

the  awaking,  9 

the  brooding,  130 

the  busy,  139 

the  ill,  16 

the  suggestible,  132-135 

various  perceptions  of,  125 
MISFORTUNE,  miscalled,  255 

self-imposed,  255 

transformed  to  fortune,  255 
MOMENTUM,   unchecked   by  de- 
feat, 300 
MOODS,  infectious,  209,  210 

the  sick  in,  209 
MORAL  DAMAGE,  of  criticism,  38 

of  evil  thinking,  38 

of  fear,  36,  37 

of  malevolence,  37 

of  morbid    conscientiousness, 
38 

of  self-analysis,  38 

of  strife,  38 

of  unbending  rigidity,  38 

stunting  personality,  38 
MORAL  DEVELOPMENT,  and  false 
piety,  304 

lopsided,  304 

relative  values  in,  304 
MORAL  DIRECTORSHIP,  need  of, 

307 
MORAL  IDEAL,  and  nerves,  307 

necessity  of  control  by,  307 
MORALITY,      crooked      thinking 
and,  235 

definition  of,  235 

education  and,  236 

eternal  adjustments  of,  238 


Morality — Continued 

harmonious  feeling  and,  235 

intellect  and,  236 

nervous  illness  and,  239,  241, 

242 

of  clever  versus  good  men,  238 
of  right  and  wrong,  235 
religion  and,  237 
the  abode  of,  236 
ugly  emotions  and,  235 
varying    standards    of,    233- 

235 

when  religious,  237 
MORAL  LIFE,  accepting  respon- 
sibility, 309 
adjustments  of,  309 
comprehensive,  309 
developed,  309 
spiritual  quality  of,  309 
MORAL    NATURE,    THE,    adjust- 
ments of,  9,  10 
and  alcoholism,  241 
and  drug  addictions,  241 
and  human  attitude,   241 
and  hypochondriasis,  241 
and  joy,  243 
and  moral  defeat,  241 
and  nervous  illness,  240 
and  neurasthenia,  241 
and  selfishness,  241 
assimilating  power  of,  240 
defects  of,  241 
effect  of  toxins  on,  240 
in  the  nervous  temperament, 

240 

invigoration  through,  240 
lifting  character,  240 
protection   through,   240 
resisting  power  of,  240 
sensitiveness  of,  240 
stabilising,  240 
wretchedness     through     per- 
verted, 241 
MORAL  SELF,  THE,  assimilative 

power  of,  240 
custom  influencing,  235 
expression  of,  236 
in  command,  236 
in  human  attitude,  241 
in  servitude,  236 


334 


INDEX 


Moral  Self — Continued 

penal  influences  and,  236 

power  in,  238 

resistance  of,  238 

social  influences  and,  236 

transmuting  power  of,  238 

unworthy  attitude  of,  241 
MORBIDNESS,  and  moral  health, 
281 

and  nervous  health,  281 

hopelessness  of,  281 

in  overconscientiousness,   280 

perverting  truth,  281 

selfish,  281 
MORBID  TEMPERAMENT,  striving 

for  cheer,  291 

MOTIVES,  for  better  doing,  314 
MUSCLES,  a  dynamo,  66 

and  the  nervous  system,  72 

appetite  from  use  of,  63 

as  enemies,  67 

as  friends,  67 

as  incinerators,  61 

as  the  furnace  of  the  body,  61 

"Blues"  and,  67 

brain-workers  and,   63 

daily  homage  to,  108 

fuel  for,  60,  61 

half  the  body  weight,  60,  66 

heat-     and    power-producing, 
61 

in  feminine  men,  68 

interaction  of  will,  work  and, 
62 

involuntary,  60 

misery  from  defective,  66 

Mrs.  Grundy  and,  68 

of  breathing,  60 

of  digestion,  60 

of  the  heart,  60,  1081 

of  the  stomach,  108 

of  the  vessels,  60 

possibilities  of,  66 

relation  of  voluntary  and  in- 
voluntary, 108 

reserve  power  from,  61,  64 

resisting  infection,  61 

sleep  from  use  of,  64 

strengthened  by  exercise,  61, 
108 


Muscles — Continued 

strengthening     the     involun- 
tary, 108 

toxins  of  unused,  66,  67 
undeveloped,  66,  67 
vitality-giving  tissues,  61 
voluntary,  60 
well-being  from,  61 
will  and,  60 
women  deficient  in,  68 


NABCOMANIACS,     from     heredi- 
tary neurotics,  173 
NATURE,    man    compared   with, 

308 

NECESSITIES,  comforts  as,  8 
NEEDS,  developing,  287 

versus  wants,  287 
NERVOUS  ENERGY,  demands  on, 

22 

disorders  of,  23 
leaks  of,  26 
misdirected,  17,  18 
of  the  maniac,  22,  23 
NERVOUS    EXHAUSTION,    causes 

of,  64,  65 
comes  slowly,  66 
drinking  excesses  and,  65 
eating  excesses  and,  65 
fear  and,  65 
recovery  slow  in,  65 
resistance  to,  65 
through  energy  leakage,  65 
under -developed   powers  and, 

65 

wrong-doing  and,  65 
NERVOUS  INDIGESTION    (see  In- 
digestion ) 
NERVOUSNESS,  a  defect  of  will, 

14 

a  disease  of  the  elect,  2 
a   disorder    of    temperament, 

13 

a  mental  disorder,  123,  124 
and      the      disease-accepting 

mind,  141 

and  the  neurotic,  13 
as  a  protective  defence,  135, 
136 


INDEX 


335 


Nervousness — Continued 
as  neurasthenia,  23 
attention  to  the  body   caus- 
ing, 136 

body's  contribution  to,  123 
conscientiousness  in,  124 
cures  of,  123 
defective     thinking     causing, 

129 

discipline  for,  225 
emotional  control  in,   14 
emotional  riot  in,  14 
emotional  waste  in,  22 
energy  leakage  of,  227 
error  causing,  129 
evidences  of,  3 
exercise  for,  3 
from  candy  eating,  82 
from  food  errors,  52 
from  hazy  thought,  129 
from  overprotection,  227 
from  wasted  will  force,  228 
harmful  memories  and,  131 
hurtful      thought      selection 

causing,  129,  130 
ignorance  causing,   129 
imperfect    teaching1    causing, 

129 

irritability  in,  54 
lack  of  effort  causing,  129 
manifestations  of,  15,  24 
mental  causes  of,  123 
mental  healing  for,  123 
misconception  of,  15 
modern,  2 

narrow  interests  of,   129 
nature  of,  13,  15,  124 
nervous  activity  versus,  13 
nurse's  contribution  to,  134 
overattention  by  others  caus- 
ing, 139 
overattention  by  self  causing, 

136,  139,  140 
overcrowded    mind     causing, 

'129 

overresponsive  brain  of,  16 
over  solicitude    causing,     134, 

135    ' 

patent  medicines  in  treatment 
of,  134 


Nervousness — Continued 

phlegmatic  temperament  and 
(see  Temperament) 

physical  treatment  for,  134 

physician's    contribution    to, 
134 

popular,  23 

prevalence  of,  2 

protecting    from    responsibil- 
ity, 135 

protecting  from  school  duties, 
136 

psychotherapeutic    treatment 
of,  123 

religions  for,  3 

religion's  influence  on,  134 

sanitaria  for,  3 

self-discipline   for,   220,   221, 
225 

sensations  of,  15,  16 

skilled  men  treating,  3 

special  foods  for,  3 

strong  emotions  causing,  130 

suggestion    in    treatment    of, 
133,  134 

superficial     knowledge     and, 
131,  132 

superstitions  of,  3 

surrender  to,  14 

symptoms  of,  15 

tenseness  in,  229 

the  brain  overresponsive  in, 
124 

thought  healing  for,  3 

toxins  and,  222 

untrained  will  causing,  130 

unwholesome         imagination 
causing,  136 

will  curing,  228 

NERVOUS    STABILITY,    aided  by 
facts,  177 

and  accurate  thought,  177 

logical  mastery  and,  177 

readjustment  and,  177 

through  rational  reeducation, 

177 

NEEVOTJS  SYSTEM,  THE,  activi- 
ties and,  11,  12 

affected  by  heredity,  28 

as  an  ally,  313 


336 


INDEX 


Nervous  System — Continued 

capacity  of,  11,  13 

central,  15 

chemical  basis  of  efficiency  of, 
73 

controlled  by  the  brain,  12 

damaged  by  alcohol,  28 

damaged  by  tobacco,  29 

effects  of  education  on,  39 

functions  of,  15 

habit  and,  12 

ideation  dependent  upon,  72 

imitative  power  of,  15,  16 

intellect  dependent  upon,  72 

intricate,  1 

judgment  dependent  upon,  72 

muscle  dependent  upon,  72 

on  edge,  73 

responsive,  1 

sensitive,  1 

sympathy  dependent  upon,  72 
NERVOUS    TEMPERAMENT,    THE, 
(see  Temperament) 

an  asset,  230 

depression  in,  151,  152 

exaltation  and,  151 

sensitive    emotional    -balance 

of,  151 

NERVOUS,  THE,  activity  misdi- 
rected in,  13,  14 

dyspeptics,  78,  79 

fear  in,  14 

governed  by  appetite,  74 

multitude  of,  2 

on  edge,  73 

over  sensitiveness  of,  73,  77 

reason  in,  14 

self-study  of,  77,  79 

sufferings  of,  13 

temperament  of,  13 

worry  habit  in,  276 
NEURASTHENIA,  241 

energy  leak  in,  26 

silent  sufferers  of,  26 
NEUROTICS,     opportune     break- 
downs of,  23 

responsibility-avoiding,  26 

self-attention  of,  25 

shrewd,  23 

sympathy-demanding,  26 


NEUROTIC,  THE,  and  drug  ease, 

173 
and    drug   stimulation,    173- 

175 

and  his  stomach,  77,  78 
emotional  poise  of,  152 
emotion  in,  197 
interests  of,  191 
need  of  thought  selection  by, 

199 

reeducation  of,  152 
self -attention  of,  191 
self-centred  interests  of,   191 


OBEDIENCE,  to  passions,  249 
to  wrong  guidance,  249 
when  slavery,  249 

OBSCURITIES,  clearing  up,   182, 
183 

OPIUM,  174 

OUT-OF-DOOR  PLAY  (see  Sport) 

OVERACIDITY,  chronic  weariness 

from,  54 
death  from,  53 
nervous  exhaustion  from,  54 
nervous  irritability  from,  54 
relation  of  nervousness  to,  54 

OVEREATING,  retarded  digestion 
from,  97 

OVERPROTECTION        ( S6C      ProtCC- 

tion) 

results  of,  210 
with  under-exercise,  109 
OVERSENSITIVENESS    (see  Sensi- 

tiveness ) 

OVERWORK,  damage  of,  102 
excuse  of,  102 
rarity  of,  102,  103 
victims  of,  103 


PAIN,  becoming  power,  291 
PAINS,  of  existence,  68 

prevalence  of,  109 
PALATE,  demanding  overrefined 

foods,  90 

lacking  in  common  sense,  90 
PARENTS,  conceding  to  whims, 
35 


INDEX 


337 


Parents — Continued 

double  standards  of,  35 

harmful  sympathy  of,  35 

injudicious  attention  by,  35, 

36 

PATIENCE,  power  of,  298 
PEACE,  amid  confusion,  313 

impatience  an  enemy  of,  288 

in  difficulty,  288 

internal,  297 

self-pity  versus,  288 

soul  at,  314 

value  of,  297 

where  found,  312,  313 
PERSONALITY,     determined     by 
will,  161 

of  teacher,  38 

stunted  by  regulations,  38 
PESSIMISM,  296 

PHYSICAL  CULTURE,  benefits  of, 
119,  120 

fake  systems  of,  119 

gymnasiums  for,  119 
PHYSICAL,  THE,  and  efficiency, 
196 

and  the  emotions,  195,  196 

wholesome  habits  of,  196 

wooings  of,  13 
PHYSICAL  TRAINING,  neglect  of, 

6 
PHYSICIAN,  attitude  of,  3,  4 

using  suggestion,  4 
PIETY,  armchair,  301 

false,  304 

when  useless,  301 
PLAY,    as    pleasurable    action, 
113,  120 

automobiling  as,  114 

becoming  work,  121 

cards  as,  113 

choice  an  element  in,  120 

dancing  as,  113 

difference  between  work  and, 
120 

disease  from  avoiding,  114 

enemies  of,  113 

in  childhood,   113 

in  school  and  college,  114 

lost  with  maturity,  113 

making  work  of,  120,  121 


Play — Continued 

master-man  at,  121,  122 

society's,  114 

spontaneous,  113 
PLAY  HABIT,  after  middle  age, 
69 

after  twenty,  69 

in  girls,  68 

in  men,  68 

versus  "tabby-cat"  lives,  69 
PLEASURE,  call  of,  1 
POISONING,  alcohol,  146 

food,  146,  147 

through  eating  errors,  50 

tobacco,  146 
POSSESSION,  actual,  284 

of  self,  309 

superficial,   284 

time  limit  of,  297 
POWER,    condensed,    283,    284 

how  represented,  283,  284 

through  muscle,  61 
POWERS,  for  adjustment,  9 

hidden  soul-,  306 

man's,  1,  9 

PREJUDICES,   displacing  reason, 
185 

in  religion,  185 

of  the  neurotic,  185 

thought  selection  in  eliminat- 
ing, 190 

PREOCCUPATION,  occupation  con- 
sisting in,  70 

PRETENSIONS,       demands       of, 
308 

self-gratifying,  308 
PRIDE,  arrogance  of,  283 

cheap,  67,  285 

determining  values,  28"3 

hindering  health,  67 

inspiring,  285 

of  clothes,  283 

of  comfort,  283 

of  externals,  285 

of  inactivity,  70 

of  individuality,  285 

of  indolence,  63 

of  intellect,  283 

resentfulness  of,  285 

worthy,  288 


338 


INDEX 


PROBLEM,  of  adjustment, 
preface 

of  mastery,  preface 

of  selection,  preface 

of  standards,  preface 

of  surrender,  preface 
PBOBLEMS,  man  bigger  than  his, 
299 

of  inner  self,  313 
PBOCBASTINATION,  avoiding  re- 
sponsibility, 102 
PBOGBESS,  and  development,  165 
PROPBIETY,  versus  health,  68 
PROSTBATION,  NEBVOUS,   of  ne- 
gro cook,  2 

PBOTECTION      ( see     Overprotec- 
tion) 

discomforts  from,  68 

health  robbed  by,  68 

pampered  bodies  of,  68 
PROTEIDS,  44 

for  brain-workers,  88 

for  the  growing  child,  86 

for  muscle-workers,  87 

in  eggs,  86 

in  milk,  86 

in  vegetables,  86 

misuse  of,  86 

need  of,  86 

PROTOPLASM,    chemical    activi- 
ties of,  52 

foundation  of  life,  52 

nature  of,  52 
PSYCH  ASTHENIA,  241 

and  fear  of  germs,  155-157 

constant  fear-life  in,  155-157 

deformed  souls  in,  157 

fear-victims  of,  155-157 

phobias  of,  155-157 

reason  helpless  in,  155 
PUDDLEB,  THE,  work  of,  9 
PUPPET,  of  one's  own  forces,  295 

REACTIONS,  and  experience,   12 
capacity  for,  12 
of  the  sensitive-plant,  12,  13 
physical,  11 
powers  of,  11 

to  misunderstandings,  12,  13 
varying,  12 


READING,  versus  doing,  301 

READJUSTMENT,  by  change  of 

attention,  192 
by  will,   192 
mental,  123 
of  brain  and  brawn,  7 

REALITY,  developing,  70 

embittering     personality     by 

denying,  198 

failure  to  meet,  188,  189 
feeling  discrediting,  186 
in  the  warped  character,  185 
reforming  fixed  ideas,  190 
results  of  denying,  185 
robbed  of  joy,  185 
saving,  34 
saving  sense  of,  70 
sentimentality  versus,  184 
through  clear  thinking,  190 
versus  surrender  to  hazy 
thought,  190 

REASON,  and  emotions,  20 
clearing  the  mists,  198 
displacing  emotion,  197 
eliminating  confusion,  193 
eliminating  error,  193 
facing  the  unexpected,  189 
governing  food  choice,  73 
in  contemplation,  199 
in  eating,  74 
in  forethought,  193 
in  suffering,  15 
in  the  nervous,  14 
in  the  normal  mind,  20 
in  the  suggestible  mind,  20 
in  thought  selection,  194 
led  by  emotions,  198 
mental  serenity  through,  194 
need  of  cultured,  75 
overcoming  fear,  207 
when  useless,  201 

REBELLION,  a  defect  of  adjust- 
ment, 246,  253 
against  control,  249 
against  duties,  254,  264 
against  interferences,  252,  253 
against  life's  lessons,  246 
against  misfortune,  255 
against  responsibility,  254 
against  study,  254 


INDEX 


339 


Rebellion — Continued 

against  surroundings,  256 
against    the    inanimate,    252, 

253 

against  the  inevitable,  247 
and  dishonest  effort,  264 
and  envy,  265 
and  home  strife,  256 
and  indolence,  265 
and  recklessness,  265 
as  a  blessing,  258 
based  on  ignorance,  246 
choking  joy,  246 
dividing  life's  forces,  246 
exhaustion  of,  269 
expressed  in  chronic  kicking, 

255 

expressed  in  grouch,  255 
expressed  in  malice,  255 
honest  mistakes  of,  246 
hopelessness  in,  254 
insufficient  cause  of,  254 
in  the  "Song  of  the  Shirt," 

253 

lack  of  reason  in,  252,  253 
nervous  leakage  of,  253 
of  hot  anger,  255 
of  passion,  249 
of  servitude,  254 
of  the  child,  252 
perverting  joy,  254 
smothering  peace,  246 
smouldering,  256 
sullen,  269 
transformed     by     hoe     and 

spade,  263,  264 
unworthy,  256-258 
RECKLESSNESS,    and    assertion, 

263 

and  moral  courage,  263 
and  surrender,  263 
cosmic    indifference    inciting, 

269 

disregarding  duty,  265 
explosive,  262 
for  the  timid,  263 
license  of,  265 
of  hodge-podge  lives,  265 
of  rebellion,  262,  264 
of  selfish  ends,  264 


Recklessness — Continued 

of     the     aggressive     nature, 
265 

place  of,  262,  263 

robbing  stability,  264,  265 

slow- working,  262 

venom  of,  264 

wisely-directed,  263,  264 
REEDUCATION,    learning   reality 
through,  243 

mental,  243 

moral,  243 

physical,  243 

teaching    the    good    of    life, 

243 

REJECTION,       cultivating      the 
habit  of,  180 

developing  thought,  180 
RELAXATION,     saving     leakage, 
229 

through  will,  229 
RELIGION,  and  morality,  237 

and  the  unseen,  237 

antagonism  of  medicine  and, 
239 

as  a  cloak,  237 

as  a  creed,  237 

crimes  in,  237 

definition  of,  237 

false,  237 

imagination  in,  237 

mind's  search  for,  237 

need  of  morality  in,  237 

tortures  of,  237 
RENUNCIATION,  as  denial,  292 

in  all  selection,  292 

necessary,  292 

of  the  monarch,  292 

of  the  musician,  292 

of  the  student,  292 

privation  through,  292,  293 

true,  293 

worthy,  292 

REPRESSED  TYPE,  THE,  attention 
in,  26 

homage  due,  26 

reactions  of,  26 

repression  in,  26 

self-control  in,  26 

silent  sufferers  of,  26 


340 


INDEX 


RESENTMENTS,  whining,  314 
RESIGNATION,     inspiration     in, 
231 

resolution  of,  231 
RESISTANCE,  damaging,  265 

exhaustion  of,  265 

of  rebellious  feeling,  265 

to  nervous  exhaustion,  65 
RESOLUTIONS,    wisely    selected, 

302 

RESPONSE,  to  change,  2 
RESPONSIBILITY,  avoiding,  102 

increasing,  8 

shifting,  101 

RESPONSIVENESS,    of    a    Shake- 
speare, 12 

of  the  dull  brain,  12 
RESTLESSNESS,  and  adjustment, 
272 

and    purposeless    movements, 
17,  18 

and  the  attention  crave,  243 

as  misdirected  energy,  17 

"habit  spasms"  and,  18 

in  thought  life,  242 

modern,  2,  5 

motor,  17 

of  empty  souls,  242 

of  shallow  living,  243 

overactivity  of,  17,  18 

questionings  of,  272 

struggles  of,  272 

sufferings  of,  272 

superficiality  and,  243 

tics  and,  18 

versus  serenity,  272 
RESTLESSNESS,    MODERN,    as    a 
frenzy  for  pleasure,  5 

as  a  mania  for  work,  5 

evidences  of,  2,  5 

in  vacations,  5 

of  children,  5 

of  the  young,  5 

prevalence  of,  2 
REWARDS,  in  art,  297 

in  finance,  297 

in  history,  297 

in  mechanics,  297 

in  professions,  297 

in  science,  297 


RIGHT,  eternal,  303 
pole-star  of,  303 
RIGIDITY,  damage  of,  38 
ROMANTICISM,  cheap,  34 

SALT,  and  Bright's  disease,  92 

danger  of  excess  of,  55 

need  of,  55 
SCHOOLS,  intensity  increased  by, 

5 
SCIENCES,  family  of,  9 

revelations  of,  9,  10 
SEASONING,  abuse  of  condiments 
in,  92,  93 

affecting  digestion,  92,  93 

Bright's   disease   from   over-, 
92 

high,  92 

salt  in,  92 
SELECTION,  active,  178 

burden  of,  178 

choosing    thought    life,    178- 
180 

displacing  desire,  180 

faulty,  138 

hurtful  mental,  130 

improved,  18X)-183 

incapacity    for    constructive, 
184 

mind  omnipotent  in,  127,  128 

of  attention,  181 

of  opinions  versus  facts,  184 

of  reason,  194 

of  the  mind's  contents,  178 

passive,  177,  178 

renunciation  in  all,  292 

saving  will,  179,  180 

the    supremacy    of    intellect, 
178 

through   forgetting,   180,   181 

through     thought     rejection, 
180,  181 

training  in,  179,  181 

unwise,  140 

versus  surrender,  preface 

wise,  preface 
SELF,  altruistic,  305 

assertion  of,  298,  299 

a    victim    of    circumstances, 
310 


INDEX 


341 


Self — Continued 

centredness,  298 

choices  of,  310 

defeat  of  the  selfish,  298 

demanding  self-discipline,  310 

developing  the  best,  303,  309 

discipline  of,  310 

finding  weaknesses,  295 

fulfilment  of,  305,  306 

how  known,  314,  315 

idle,  296 

in  cheer,  305 

indulgence,  298,  310 

in  ministry,  305 

in  order,  314 

many-sided,  302 

moulded,  310 

noble,  308 

pity,  298 

possible,  310 

power  of,  306 

reactions  of,  301 

sacrifice  of,  305 

seeking,  298 

stock  of,  310 

successful,  315 

superior,  308" 

the  actual,  311 

the  actual  versus  the  possible, 
310 

the  inner,  285 

the  resolute,  295 

the  understanding,  295 

training  self,  301 

versus  things,  310 

victorious,   305,   306 
SELF-ASSERTION,  a  force,  251 

developing  the  best,  303 

for  the  modern  man,  248 

fruits  of,  248,  249 

mastery  through,  248,  249 

of  the  greedy  self,  251 

of  the  untrained  self,  251 

perverted,  251 

problem  of,  249 

resisting  correction,  251 

self-seeking  of,  251 

spurning  idealistic  morality, 
251 

subduing,  298,  299 


Self -Assertion — Continued 
versus  self-repression,  249 
when  to  employ,  249 
when  to  restrain,  249,  250 

SELF-ATTENTION,   blocking   rea- 
son, 25 
egoism  of,  25 
of  the  hypochondriacal  type, 

24 

to  the  body,  24 
weakening  will,  25 

SELF-CENTRED   TYPE    (see   Self- 
ishness) 

SELF-CONTROL,     attention     the 

basis  of,  163 
defective,  214 

neurotics  from  lack  of,  214 
of  the  repressed  type,  26 

SELF-DENIAL,    lessened   demand 

for,  168,  169 
opportunities  for,  171 
progress  depends  on,  171 
will  strength  depends  on,  172 

SELF-FORGETFULNESS,    a   saving 
habit,  139 

SELF-INDULGENCE,  an  enemy  of 

will,  169 

causing    intolerance    of    dis- 
comfort, 169 
coddling  ills,  169 
in  modern  comforts,  169 

SELF-INTEREST,  demoralising,  25 

SELF-INTOXICATION,  avoiding,  53 
causing  nervousness,  54 
physical  damage  of,  54 
reduced  alkalinity  from,  54 

SELFISHNESS,    a    human    reac- 
tion, 105 

defacing  character,  25 
defeats  of,  298 
demanding:  expression,  26 
of  the  self-centred  type,  25 
pleasures  of,  11 
reason  blocked  by,  25 
turning  from,  10,  11 
will  weakened  by,  25 

SELF-PITY,  devitalising,  25 
disease  of,  267 
limiting  self,  267 
poisoning  feeling,  267 


342 


INDEX 


SELF-STUDY,  contracting,  25 

of  body  functions,  24 
SENSATIONS,  of  nervousness,  15, 
16 

tangle  of,  16 

SENSITIVENESS,     avoiding     dis- 
comforts, 19 

capacity  for,  106 

drug-users  and,  19,  20 

feeling  ruling  in,  19 

focusing    on   the    unpleasant, 
106 

misery  from,  19 

of  the  hypersensitive  type,  18 

over-,  8,  73,  77,  105,  106 

pride  of,  18 

quiet  demanded  by,  19,  20 

reason  in,  18 

to  discomforts,  105,  106 

to  petty  annoyances,  105 

true,  19 

SENSITIVE-PLANT,  12 
SENTIMENTALISM,  versus  health, 

67 

SERENITY,  destroyed  by  unwise 
choice,  275 

rare,  272 

through  will,  219 
SHAKESPEARE,    the    "thousand- 

souled,"  12 
SLAVES,  man's,  1 
SLEEP,  artificial,  230 

assuring  normal,  231 

mental  tension  an  enemy  of, 
230 

plans  for  assuring,  230 

potion,  230 
SLEEPLESSNESS,  problem  of,  230 

food  poisoning  in,  230 

toxic-worry,  230 
SOUL,  THE,  adjustments  of,  287 

an  omnipotent  force,  287 

at  peace,  314 

battles  of,  287 

determining  attention,  286 

determining  feeling,  286 

determining  selection,   286 

energy  of,  299 

gymnasium  of,  293 

harmony  of,  314 


Soul,  The — Continued 

healthy,  314 

life  a  chess-board  for,  312 

mastery  of,  312 

neglecting  the,  297 

nobility  of,  315 

possessions  of,  289 

potency  of,  299 

the  master  of  life,  286 

transforming  experience,  291 
SPIRITUAL,  THE,  neglect  of,  297 

seeking  the  best,  312 

true,  312 
SPORT,  baseball  as,  117 

camping  as,  115,  116 

canoeing  as,  115 

golf  as,  116 

hill-climbing  as,  115 

hunting  as,  116 

swimming  as,  115 

tennis  as,  116,  117 

the  English  and,  115 

tramping  as,  115 

walking  as,  115 

yachting  as,  115 
SPORTSMAN,  ideals  of  the,  121, 
122 

master -man  a  true,  121 

transmuting  drudgery,  121 
STABILITY,   alcohol   robbing  of, 
30 

amid  confusion,  261 

defeated  by  calamity,  262 

drain  upon,  37 

exceptional,  5 
STIMULI,  external,  11 

internal,  11 

of  modern  life,  6 

reaction  of  nervous  system  to, 

11,  16 

STOLIDITY,  rare,  5 
STOMACH,  a  beast  of  burden,  93 

digestion,  87 

effect  of  greases  on  the,  79 

effect  of  sweets  on  the,  79 

fermentation  in  the,  79 

food  insults  to  the,  92 

food  "sprees"  and  the,  94 

homage   to  the,    80 

mind's  influence  on,  76,  77 


INDEX 


343 


Stomach — Continued 

nervous  indigestion  of  the,  77 

normally  bitter,  79 

normally  sour,  79 

rebellion  of  the,  93 

requiring  regular  feeding,  94 

the  neurotic  and  his,  77-79 
STRENGTH,     danger     from     de- 
pleted, 269 

for  resistance,  269 

knows  not  exhaustion,  269 

surplus,  269 

through  muscle  use,  61,  62 

welcomes  fatigue,  269 
STBIFE,  accepting  renunciation, 
292 

disagreements  as,  257 

energy-destroying,  314 

essential,  274,  275 

for  learning,  294 

for  possession,  284 

for  self,  285 

for  social  success,  285,  294 

for  wealth,  284,  294 

home,  257 

of  body  against  soul,  245 

perfecting  personality,  294 

pride  engendering,  285,  286 

saving,  290,  292,  294 

seething  in,  286 

selfish,  284-286 

strength  born  of,  293 

to  surpass,  285 

turning  from,  314 

waste  of,  286 

weariness  of,  286 

with  desire,  245 

with  feelings,  275 

with  instincts,  245 

with  others,  245 

with  self,  245,  274 

with  temptations,  245 

with  tendencies,  245 

with  the  inanimate,  245 

with  thoughts,  275 

with  will,  275 
STRIVINGS,  for  self,  307 

of  body,  307 

of  mind,  307 

results  of  self-,  307 


SUBACIDOSIS,  53 

SUBCONSCIOUSNESS,  THE,  accu- 
mulations  from,  300,  301 

and  character,  300 

influence  of,  300 
SUCCESS,  false,  294 

habit  of,  304 

how  achieved,  247 

meeting      requirements       of, 
302 

through  fighting,  248 

through    utilising    obstacles, 
247 

true,  294 
SUFFERING,  a  force,  274 

an  excuse,  274 

animals  and,  273 

as  a  help,  262 

as  damage,  262 

attitude  toward,  261 

man's,  273 

man's  capacity  for,  13 

mission  of,  261,  274 

nervous,  267 

unnecessary,  13 

work  done  in,  312 
SUGGESTIBILITY,  and  hysteria, 
21 

and  nervous  invalidism,  133- 
135 

cure  of,  133 

definition  of,  20 

developing  symptoms,  20 

imitative  power  of,  133,  134 

memory  an  agent  of,  21 

normal  in  childhood,  20 

of  the  suggestible  type,  20 

patent  medicines  and,  20 

professional  contributions  to, 
134,  135 

root  idea  in,  21 

through  imagination,  132 

versus  reason,  20,  132,  133 
SUGGESTIBLE    TYPE     (see    Sug- 
gestibility) 
SUGGESTION,  auto-,  21 

by  physician,  4 

from  without,  20 

through  electricity,  4 

through  hydrotherapy,  4 


344 


INDEX 


SUPERFICIAL    KNOWLEDGE,    air- 
hunger  from,  132 

and  pulse-feelers,  131,  132 

phobias  of,  131,  132 

self-satisfaction  in,   131 
SUPERIORITY,      by     intellectual 
displacement,  8 

honours  of,  8 
SUPREMACY,  soul's,  298 
SURRENDER,  a  defective  reaction, 
261 

and  nervous  habits,  227 

attitude  of,  105 

conscience  resisting,  274 

disregarding  duty,  265 

ease  of,  274 

exhausting  joy,  265 

happiness  and,  242 

hurt  of,  265 

interest    of    defeat    through, 
304 

moral,  242 

nervousness  from,  261 

of  effort,  2181,  261 

of  intention,  261 

of  resistance,  261 

of  weakness,  105 

of  will,  227 

remorse  and,  242 

shame  and,  242 

sufferings  of,  242 
'  temptations  to,  288 

to  despair,  266 

to  dread,  242 

to  irritations,  105 

to  moodiness,  105 

to  nervous  illness,  242 

to  pleasure,  274 

to  profit,  274 

to  rebellion,  261 

to  recklessness,  242,  266 

to  selfishness,  105 

to  sensitiveness,  105 

to  the  commonplace,  263 

to  vassalage,  242 

unworthy,  288 

versus  endurance,  261 
SURROUNDINGS,   adjustment   to, 
9,  10 


SWEETS,  abundance  of,  82 
acidity  from,  84 
acid-producing,    53 
and  efficiency,  84,  85 
autointoxication  from,  85 
becoming  vinegar,  84 
chemical  reactions  of,  84 
damage  of  excess  in,  83 
for  the  muscle- worker,  83 
"green  bile"  from,  85 
in  excess,  53 
inherited  love  of,  82 
intense  desire  for,  82 
intestinal    indigestion    from, 

83 

mental  depression  from,  85 
nervousness  and,  82 
overfeeding  with,  83 
perversion  of  appetite  by,  85, 

86 

proper  use  of,  86 
rare  in  the  past,  82 
use  of,  after  puberty,  85 
SYMPATHETIC  NERVOUS  SYSTEM, 

THE,  governing  involuntary 

muscles,  144,  145 
governing  vital   organs,    144, 

145 
governing  voluntary  muscles, 

145 

influencing  the  body,   144 
the  fear-thought  and,  144 
SYMPATHY,  harmful,  35 
helpful,  36 
rightful,  191 

"TABBY-CAT"  LIVES,  69 
TEA,  a  drug,  91 

a  poison,  56 

nervous  damage  from,  56 

not  a  true  food,  91 

questionable  value  of,  91 

stimulating  action  of,  56 

"topers,"  56 

TEMPERAMENT,    accepting    self, 
290 

changing,  290 

common  sense  and,  290 

morbid,  290 


INDEX 


345 


Temperament — Continued 

nervous,  13 

phlegmatic,  12 

will  and,  291 
TEMPTATIONS,  of  mind,  297 

of  modern  man,  297 

to  neglect  soul,  297 
TENSION,  high,  5 

an  enemy  to  sleep,  230 

of  modern  life,  5 
THINKING,  above  self,  191 

accurate,  177 

active,  178 

and  accuracy  of  speech,  182 

and  nervousness,   193 

associated  with  doing,  187 

attraction  power  of,  193 

chaotic,  188,  189 

choice  in,  178,  181 

clear,  180-183 

clearing  obscurity,  181-183 

controlled  by  active  selection, 
178,  179 

cultivating,  179,  180 

deliberate,  192 

developing  nervousness,  179 

error  in,  187 

fixed  ideas  in,  190 

forming  habits  of,  182 

frivolous,  191 

habitual  uncertainty  in,  189 

impracticable,    189 

inaccuracy  of,  102,  184 

limited,  192 

nervous  stability  and  accur- 
ate, 177 

obscured  by  crowding  mind, 
181 

passive,  178 

place    of    interest    in,     178, 
179 

readjusted  by  will,  192 

reformed  by  reality,  190 

right  for  wrong,  192 

selection  in,  178-180 

self-centred,  191 

training  the  mind  through, 

179-183 
THOUGHTS,  crooked,  199 


Tics,  examples  of,  18 

exhausting,  18 
TOBACCO,  not  a  true  food,  91 
TOLERANCE,  learning,  219 

of  discomfort,  219 
TRAINING,  through  control,  36 

through  endurance  of  the  dis- 
agreeable, 36 

through  play,  34 

through    regular    feeding,    32 

through  self-help,   36 

through  true  sympathy,  36 

through  wholesome  foods,  33 
TYNDALL,  on  character,  238 

UNDER-DEVELOPMENT,  weariness 

of,  109 
UNHAPPINESS,   compulsions   of, 

312 

wretched  story  of  human,  312 
UNPLEASANT,   focusing  on  the, 

106 
UNWORTHINESS,  rectifying  sense 

of,  273 
stultifying,  273 

VALUES,  relative,  289 

worldly,  289 
VICTIM,  of  circumstances,  295 

of  nerves,  295 
VICTORY,  moral,  245,  246 
VIRTUES,  leadership  of,  281 
VOLITION,  and  the  moral  nature, 
293 

supreme  value  of,  293 

WALKING,  afield,  115 

the  English  and,  115 
WANTS,     affecting     enjoyment, 
274 

deceiving,  287 

dominating,  287 

overgrowth  of,  274 

versus  needs,  287 
WATER,  aiding  digestion,  93 

necessary  amount  of,  93 

need  of,  55 

underdrinking  of,  55 

with  meals,  93 


346 


INDEX 


WEAKLINGS,  following  least  re- 
sistance, 107 
loafing,  107 
of  doping,  107 
whining,  107 

WEAKNESSES,      developed      by 
strife,  273 

WEALTH,  a  destroyer  of  charac- 
ter, 101 

an  incubator  of  disease,  101 
children  of,  101 
dominating  labour,  101 
evolution  of,  100 
frail  bodies  the  toll  of,  101 
indolence  of,  101 
products  of,  101 
spendthrifts  of,  100 
tense  nerves  the  toll  of,  101 
weak  muscles  the  toll  of,  101 

WEARINESS,     attitude     toward, 

302 

cure  for,  218 
disguised,  218 
earned  by  work,  64 
emotional,  64 
of  indolence,  67 
of  life,  302 

of  self-amusement,  298 
of  the  chronic  loafer,  64 
of  the  "tired-out,"  64 
of  work  of  mind,  218" 
power  earned  through,  64 
through  emotional  excess,  64 
through  lack  of  work,  64 
through  toxic  excess,  64 
unwarranted,  218 
versus  exhaustion,  64 

WHOLESOMENESS,  spiritual,  297 

WILFULNESS,  a  force,  217 
hope  in,  217 
in  the  nervous,  217 
is  misdirected  will,  217 
transformed  to  will,  217 

WELL,  accepting  inconveniences, 

223 

action  born  in,  214 
action  the  end  of,  164 
active,  161 

adjustment  through,  230 
a  dominating  power,   171 


Will— Continued 
and  drugs,   174,   175 
and  energy  waste,  17 
and  hard  exercise,  220,  221 
and  involuntary  muscles,  108 

(see  Muscles) 
and  our  ills,  169,  170 
and  physical  effort,  217 
anger  and,  226 
antagonism   of   emotion   and, 

211 

back-bone   of   the   moral   na- 
ture, 9 

basis  of  decision,  223 
basis  of  execution,  223 
battlefield  of,  159 
battles  of,  226 
changing  dislikes  into   likes, 

229 
choosing   the   disagreeable, 

223 

contributions  to,  215,  216 
deficient,  14 

determining  health,   219-221 
determining  personality,    161 
developed  by  effort,  161,  162 
developing,  215 
development      of      character 

through,  164 
discomforts  and,  288 
displaced  by  drugs,  175 
doubt  an  enemy  of,  168 
effort  of,  217 
emotions  and,  163-165 
endurance  through,  162 
enemies  of,  164-170 
enforcing     laws     of     health, 

172 

exaggeration  and,  162 
exhausting  battles  of,  167 
facing  fear,  229 
failure  to  cultivate,  169,  170, 

172 

freedom  of,  159,  160 
healing  power  of,  229 
higher  interests  and,  164 
hopelessness      of      weakened, 

223-225 

ills  challenging  the,  216 
in  attention,  159,  160,  162 


INDEX 


347 


Will — Continued 

in    deliberate    determination, 

160,  161 

indolence  and,  165,  166 
in  emotional  control,  210,  211 
in  indecision,  166-168 
in  inhibition,  166,  167 
in  self -discipline,  220,  221 
in  starting  the  day,  220,  221 
in  suffering,  162,  163 
intellect  and,  159,  167 
in  the  insistent  "No,"  226 
in  the  selfish,  170,  171 
making  demands  on  self,  220- 

224 

manacling  attention,  219 
neglect  of,  6 
nervous  wreckage  from  weak, 

175 

of  the  hypochondriac,  24 
pain  and,  228 
Panama  Canal,  a  tribute  to, 

217 

power  of,  14 
progress  through,  165 
raising  the  fatigue  limit,  110 
rationally  directed,  171 
reason  dependent  on,  214 
relaxation  through,  229 
remodelling  emotions,  210 
results  of  weak,  162 
self-indulgence  an   enemy  of, 

169 

self-pity  an  enemy  of,  170 
serenity  through,  219 
slight  discomforts  and,  162 
surrender  of,  211 
surrendering     to     weariness, 

110 

surrender  of,  227 
that  can  will,  175 
the  basis  of  character,  215, 

219 

the  basis  of  self-control,  163 
the  neurotic  and  his,  162 
the  vacillations  of,  168 
transforming-  power  of,  229 
unwilling,  218,  219 
versus  wilfulness,  170,  171 
versus  wish,  222 


Will — Continued 

wasted,  179 

wasting  force  of,  227 

weakened,  223,  225 

weakened  nervous  energy  and, 
225 

when  effortless,  160 

when  exhausting,   160 

widening  margins  of,  221 

witnessed  by  action,  110 

working  toward  an  object, 

218 
WISH,  in  day-dreams,  137 

influence  of  the,   138 

in  night-dreams,  137 
WIT,  and  modern  inventions, 
62 

displacing  muscle,  62,  63 

in  primitive  man,  63 

permitting  indolence,  63 
WOMEN,  and  muscle,  68 

hothouse,  101 
WORK,  anxiety  in,  104 

as  drudgery,  65 

associated  feelings  of,  104 

a  therapeutic  agent,  107,  108 

breakdown  from,  103 

benefits  of,  108 

call  to,  293 

consecration  of,  103 

damage  from,  104 

defective  methods  of,  107 

dignity  of,  111 

discounted  by  emotions,  103 

dragged-out  existence  of,  103 

education  of,  107 

efficiency  discounted  in,  105 

expressing  faith,  305 

fear  in,  104 

helpful  emotions  in,  104 

interest  of,  305 

love  of,  103 

methods  of,  103 

over-,  65 

place  of  drudgery  in,  107,  111 

playing  at,  70 

poor  methods  of,  104 
WORKERS,   evolution   of  wealth 
and,  100 

large  class  of  brawn-,  99 


348 


INDEX 


Workers — Continued 

levelling  factors  among,  100 
unholy  distinctions  among, 

100 
WOBEY,  and  inadequate  will, 

277 

and  narrowness,  277 
as  a  reaction  of  ignorance, 

277 

climax  of,  277 
distorting  power  of,  277 
expression  of,  276 
habit,  276,  277 
home,  276 


Worry — Continued 
injuring  reason,  276 
lurking  places  of,  277 
masquerading,  276,  277 
mockery  of,  277 
modern,  275 
nature  of,  276 
surrender  to,  275 
teaching  fear,  277 
through  ambition,  230 
through  apprehension,  230 

ZOOPHYTES,  marine,  300 
microscopic  work  of,  300 


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